Next In The Line
by Cry-Of-A-Warp-Engine
Summary: The Enterprise E is appointed its new captain... and everything that can go wrong, does. (Co-op with Redrose85)
1. Past Losses

"Copy U.S.S Enterprise, proceed into the asteroid area."

The Ambassador class U.S.S Enterprise N.C.C 1701-C slowly entered the mass of small asteroids ahead, purple space dust among them. This was the first time a Federation starship had entered this area, on the very edge of the Beta Quadrant. Already, they'd passed the Romulan area, now just entering the Delta Quadrant.

"Long range scan, check if we've got company." The captain says before the scan comes back, the results on the screen.

"What is that? Zoom in on it." The captain says, the screen zooming in on a red area, revealing a ship no one recognised.

"That ship doesn't appear anywhere in our database, captain… this must be a new species." Claire Kenton says, turning her chair around to look at the captain.

"Kenton… you've been working for a while, go have a rest." The captain says, seeing the tiredness in Claire's eyes. Claire nods before getting up, going to the turbolift and heading for deck 4.

"Claire, got a break?" Trevor says as Claire enters hers and Trevor's quarters, Trevor holding the two week old baby in his arms.

"Yeah, I was getting tired. How's Samantha feeling?" Claire says, taking baby Sam from Trevor's arms.

"She's not liking the new periods of time you spend on the bridge, she wants her momma with her." Trevor says.

"Ah, well I've got a job to do, working tactical on the bridge and keeping us all safe from the bad guys, Samantha." Claire says, Sam looking at her with wide brown eyes.

"Come in." Claire says as the door rings, it opening to reveal Brad.

"I took some time out, decided to come see little Samantha. Who by the way, is just beautiful. Here, got something for her." Brad says, pulling out a small model phaser pistol.

"Maybe some day, she'll be on a ship herself, either firing the torpedoes or maintaining the warp core like me." Brad says, giving it to Claire who held it's handle for a moment before putting it next to Samantha's crib.

"I could imagine that. Who knows what the future holds?" Claire says before the ship shakes violently, a distant explosion being heard.

"Kenton! Get back to the bridge, the ship's under attack!" The captain says through the ship-wide speakers. Claire passes Samantha to Trevor before running into the corridor, back to the turbolift and then the bridge.

"Captain, ready to fire on your order!" Claire says, standing at the tactical station.

"Fire all forward phasers and torpedoes, target that thing anywhere!" The captain says, Claire firing all seven forward-facing phaser arrays and all four forward torpedoes, all hitting a heavy shield.

"Okay… tactical analysis." The captain orders.

"Highly advanced shielding… armoured hull plating… thirty seven torpedo tubes, sixty disruptor banks, twenty phaser arrays." Claire says, looking at the scan of the dark grey ship, looking like a mix of a Klingon Bird Of Prey and a Federation Constellation class ship.

At once, the ship fires all forward weapons at the Enterprise, tearing the hull apart and taking down the shields instantly.

"Shields down, Hull at 52%! One more hit like that, we're finished!"

A larger, blue torpedo hits the bridge, tearing open the top, the captain, first officer and several crew members being sucked out.

"Right, Kenton assuming command! Bring us to face that thing!" Claire says, the ship turning before Claire fires everything at the other ship, taking down the shields but the ship itself was untouched.

"Okay…" Claire says before sitting in the captain's chair, turning on a ship-wide broadcast. "All crew, abandon ship! Get to escape pods!" She says. Across the ship, everyone ran to their nearest escape pods.

"Claire!" Trevor says through his communicator after getting into an escape pod with Brad, Sam in his arms.

"Trevor, I'm gonna set a collision course then I'll be in a pod. Don't worry about me, just eject and get out of here!" Claire says before Trevor reluctantly ejected the pod.

Claire knew it wasn't going to go that way. The automatic systems had been destroyed, the ship requiring manual control. Claire runs to the navigations panel, rotating the ship to face the other ship and diverting all power to the engines, activating full impulse.

"Claire?! No, you have to be with us!" Trevor says.

"Too late now, Trevor. You and Brad, you two take care of Samantha… please, just live. For me." Claire says, tears running down her face.

"Listen to me Trevor, I love you." Claire says as the last few hundred meters came.

"I love you too, Claire!" Trevor says, letting a few tears fall.

"I lo-" Claire says before the whole ship goes up in a massive explosion, the other ship also exploding. Trevor stares out of the window, tears running down his face as Sam started screaming.

"Samantha…" Trevor says, raising Sam up and hugging her close, Brad placing a hand on Trevor's shoulder as he too, cried. He places the model phaser next to Trevor who holds it, staring at the handle that Claire held.

"Trevor… I'm here for you. Both of you… whenever you need me." Brad says, Trevor nodding as the escape pod drifts through space. Hopefully, the distress signal would be answered.


	2. New Crew

**22 years later…**

Captain Sam Phillips sat behind her desk in her quarters aboard the Enterprise E, reading a book. She'd recently been appointed as it's captain, moving on from being captain aboard the U.S.S Concord.

"Come in." Sam says as the door rings.

"Captain, everything okay?" Carly says, the new tactical officer walking in.

"Ah, Caroline, right?" Sam says, putting her book down.

"Yes. Most people just call me Carly." The 20 year old says.

"Well, Carly it is. What do you think of the Enterprise?" Sam says.

"It's one of the biggest I've ever seen… I was on a Miranda class before this." Carly says as Sam gets up, going to her replicator.

"Yes, I did step aboard the U.S.S Kenton once… Claire Kenton was my mother, died when I was only a couple weeks old but she saved 600 people… I'm glad she got a form of memorial." Sam says before turning to the replicator. "Coffee, milk. Hot." She says, a cup of hot coffee appearing in the replicator.

"Captain, there's a problem in one of the rooms." Someone says over the intercom.

"What's the problem?" Sam asks.

"Power's going weird down there, most likely a blown wire." The voice says.

"Well… you must be new out of the academy. If something's wrong, you don't have to tell me unless it threatens the ship. So get it fixed, we leave spacedock tomorrow." Sam says.

"Okay... one more thing-" The person says, two voices shouting in the background.

"Damn it, what are Gionna and Ashley fighting about this time?" Carly says.

"You know those two? If they do that often, we're gonna have problems because they've both been put on this ship." Sam says.

"I'll handle my roommates, Captain.'' Carly says before leaving and walking to the room where Ashley and Gionna are.

"Every time you and Johnny end up fighting, you always take it out on me!" 21 year old Gionna yells.

"Because he always tells you things that he never tells me!" Ashley shouts.

"Hey, calm down! One at a time, explain what happened." Carly says, pulling Gionna away from Ashley. Carly was sick of these two constantly fighting with each other but the shouting continued and Carly walks away, hooking her earbuds up to her phone and putting them in her ears, starting up her MP3 app, Sky Blue by Peter Gabriel playing as Carly leaned against the wall, closing her eyes.

Johnny had turned the corner, walking towards the room where Ashley and Gionna were fighting but stopped when he saw Carly. He didn't know her too well but knew what was bothering her so he walks into the room where Gionna and Ashley are, hoping that they're not trying to kill each other.

"Okay, we're on the Federation flagship. The most advanced and biggest ship in the fleet, at the gates of a whole new future and you're more concerned about yelling in each other's faces?!" Johnny says, pulling Gionna away from Ashley.

"She fucking started it!" Ashley yells.

"Gionna, go and calm down in a different room kiddo." Johnny says before Gionna leaves. "Why do you always have to give her a hard time Ash?'' He says.

"Maybe because you spend more time with her than your own girlfriend?!" Ashley says.

"Well, romance clashes aboard Enterprise, huh? What a brilliant start." Sam says as she walks in, having listened to the whole conversation.

"C...captain? I… apologize." Ashley says, stepping back as she sees Sam's four gold pin badges on her shirt collar.

"Apology accepted. Now tell me, without yelling, what happened?" Sam says.

Johnny walks out as Sam and Ashley talk calmly, seeing Carly sitting on the floor and looking half asleep.

"Did you not sleep when you heard you were going on the most important ship in Starfleet?" Johnny says, Carly looking up and shutting her MP3 app off, pulling her earbuds out and putting them and her phone in her pocket.

"I was happy... until I got stuck with those two as roommates." Carly says as Johnny sits next to her.

"Why not ask the captain? She seems to like you." Johnny says.

"I've thought about it but the only other available room belongs to Jack and Ivory and they fight even worse." Carly says as Man On The Corner by Genesis starts playing.

"Oh for god's sakes, is the computer malfunctioning again?" Sam says.

"Seems like it… shall I tell engineering to get it fixed?" Ashley says, Sam nodding before Ashley leaves, glancing at Johnny before getting in the turbolift.

"I'll never understand it." Carly says as Shock The Monkey by Peter Gabriel starts playing now.

"Engineering, get that computer fixed." Sam says, looking annoyed by the songs.

"That thing's been doing this for ages, got damaged in a battle under the last captain. I keep saying they need to put a new unit in but apparently that'll take too long." Sam says, walking out into the hallway where Carly and Johnny were sat.

"I like that song... what happened under the former captain's command?'' Carly says.

"They ran into some Klingons on the way back to earth, ship got badly damaged. They had to tow it back here, that was four months ago. There was very nearly an Enterprise F." Sam says, going to a screen in the wall and bringing up a 3D map of the damage done to the ship.

"No, you started it Jack!" Ivory yells, startling Carly.

"Oh… I hate bickers. Much more of this, people are gonna start getting moved off the ship." Sam says. Carly shook her head as All Along The Watchtower by Jimi Hendrix started playing over the intercom.

"Hey, I'm not taking the blame for messing with the engineering room Ivory! That was you!" Jack yells.

"Oh, for fuck's sake." Carly says.

"Please… try to avoid swearing on the ship, we do have families on board. And you, Ivory. You messed with the computer?" Sam says, Ivory looking more sensible when he saw Sam.

"Yeah… sorry, I-" Ivory says, stopping as Big Balls by ACDC starts playing loudly across the whole ship.

"Okay, that's just perfect. Someone stop that thing!" Sam says, Jack quietly singing along to the song.

"I've got big balls… oh, such big balls and they're hairy big balls." Jack sings quietly, Sam glancing at him, making him stop.

"You two are complete morons!" Carly says angrily, startling Jack and Ivory.

"What?" Jack says before singing along with the next part. "My balls are always bouncing and my ballroom always full, and everybody comes and comes again-"

"Stop!" Sam shouts, everyone going silent.

"Right. Ivory, cut out that music. Jack, stop singing along with it and Johnny, stop… oh, everyone just cut it out. You're on the flagship of humanity, you'll be representing earth to every alien race we come across." Sam says, sounding fed up.

"Yes, capt- you've gotta be kidding." Carly says as Easy Lover by Phil Collins and Phillip Bailey starts playing. Sam goes to the screen in the wall, tapping in her authorization codes and muting the intercom.

"Ivory, Jack, go to the computer core and reverse the damage you've done." Sam orders.

"Yes, captain." They say before leaving, Carly biting her lip to keep from singing one of her favorite songs. Carly and Johnny walk to Carly, Gionna and Ashley's quarters, walking in and closing the door.

"Idiots. Those two are idiots." Carly says.

"They carry on, they're gonna get us all kicked off the Enterprise. Then we'll all end up sweeping the corridors in some freighter or medical ship." Johnny says.

Carly rubbed the back of her neck like she normally did when she was agitated, Johnny reaching over and tickling her, startling her. "Johnny!" Carly says, laughing.

"What? We've got until tomorrow when we have to be at our stations, nothing other than turning on the warp nacelles happens until then." Johnny says. Carly looks at him, the shift from blue to violet noticeable in her eyes. "Come here, tiny one!" Johnny says, picking Carly up and throwing her onto her bed, tickling her some more and making her laugh.

"God, how does Gionna put up with you?!" Carly says, rolling around as Johnny tickles her.

Johnny responds by pressing his lips against Carly's forehead, blowing a raspberry kiss and making her laugh as Billy opens the door, seeing this.

"Careful, John. She's too little to be playing around with roughly." Billy says jokingly.

"Hey Billy." Carly says, taking some time to catch her breath after Johnny stops tickling her.

"What? Gionna's tiny too." Johnny says, Billy shaking his head and smiling. We've Got Tonight by Bob Seger starts playing over the intercom.

"Ivory again?" Billy says.

"Yeah." Carly says, shaking her own head as she tries to keep from singing but can't. Johnny's hand brushes against Carly's inner right thigh, Billy looking right at Johnny.

"Make sure Ash doesn't see you two." Billy says before leaving, closing the door behind him.

 **Meanwhile...**

Gionna pulled her hair into a ponytail as she walks into the room, Jack and Ivory stop arguing and look at her. "Hey there guys. Any luck fixing that thing?" She says, tempted to pull her hair out of it's ponytail and hide the scar. Ivory asked her about it once but Gionna didn't tell him how it happened.

"Nope. Were you fighting with Ashley again?" Jack says, Gionna nodding.

"You two never stop… just like us." Ivory says.

"Yeah... strange thing is, she and I used to get along with each other." Gionna says, walking over and fixing the intercom with ease. 'That was a long time ago... before that maniac attacked me.' She thought, Ivory glancing at the scar. "See? Now keep the stunts to a minimum, boys." She says even though they're older than her. Gionna turns around, walking into the hallway as Ivory follows her, stopping her.

"Ivory-" Gionna says.

"You can't keep it bottled up forever. What happened to you?" Ivory says.

Gionna took a deep breath. "I... I was walking home one night when I was 13 when someone grabbed me and held a knife to my neck while-" Gionna says, blinking her tears away.

"Did he-" Ivory says.

"No... Johnny showed up and beat him to death. Cracked the guy's skull." Gionna says, Ivory nodding before Gionna walks off.

"She gonna be okay?" Jack says as he walks over to Ivory.

"I think she'll manage… come on, we don't want to piss off the captain any more than we have." Ivory says.

"Okay... sorry about throwing that snow cone at you earlier." Jack says.

"All is forgiven, little brother." Ivory says before they leave.

Gionna kept walking down the hallway, a pair of hands stopping her before she collides with the person. "Oh.. sorry, Billy." She says, seeing Billy.

"You alright kid?" Billy says, Gionna nodding.

"Yeah… just reliving unwanted memories." Gionna says. Billy pulls Gionna into a hug, Gionna wrapping her arms around him and resting her head on his shoulder.

"I read your file… I was attacked too, long time ago." Sam says, stood a few meters away from them.

"I... I didn't know that." Gionna says as she and Billy let go.

"I tend not to discuss it… too revealing. People don't expect that in a captain." Sam says, drinking some of the coffee she'd gotten from her replicator.

Gionna nods, Sam seeing the scar and resting her hand on Gionna's right shoulder.

"Don't think because I'm the captain that I'm completely heartless. I care for every one of my crew. If you need me, just ask and I'll do what I can." Sam says.

"Thank you captain." Gionna says before leaving and walking deeper into the hallway, Terry opening his door at the same time. "Hey... you have a rough day too?" She says, stopping.

"I expect it'll be easier when we leave spacedock and have jobs to do." Terry says.

"Well... maybe Ashley and I won't kill each other by then." Gionna says, thinking back to when their friendship fell apart.

 **8 years ago, Acter, Alderney.**

"Oh... hi, Ash." Gionna says as she opens the door, Ashley not happy to see the small brunette in Johnny's apartment.

"Prey tell me what the fuck you're doing here." Ashley says, looking right at Gionna.

"Hanging out with Johnny like I usually do. You've been acting strange for the past week. Why?" Gionna says, Ashley seeing the scar on Gionna's neck when she pulled the younger girl's hood off of her head.

"Maybe because... I don't like opposition." Ashley says.

"Ash, Johnny and I grew up together, we're like siblings. Opposition? You're paranoid." Gionna says, Ashley enraged.

"Paranoid?! Maybe that guy didn't really attack you! What guy would want a child when they could find a grown ass woman?!" Ashley shouts.

"Okay, forget paranoid, you're a crazy ass bitch!" Gionna says, shouting at the end. She was losing her patience and letting her temper be revealed, infuriating Ashley.

"Just… fuck off and study for the Starfleet thing you want! Something better than being here!" Ashley yells.

"Back off of her, Ashley!" Johnny says, walking towards them and putting himself in front of Gionna. "Don't make me choose between you and Gionna, you won't like the choice I make." He says, shocking Ashley.

"You'd pick the kid over me?! Well, maybe I'll just have to make her leave then!" Ashley shouts.

"You won't even come near her! Just fucking try it because one is all I need and there won't be a second!" Johnny yells. Ashley storms off before Johnny closes the door and sees Gionna run her hand through her hair like she does when she's aggravated. Johnny walks over and playfully pulls one of Gionna's dark brown curls, trying to make her smile but it wasn't working.

"This is fucked up." Gionna says, surprising Johnny because she never cursed.

"Watch your mouth." Johnny says, resting his hands on Gionna's sides like he does when he wants to tickle her.

"Johnny..." Gionna says, fighting a smile. Johnny always knows how to make her feel better when she was in a bad mood. Johnny starts tickling Gionna, making her laugh. "Johnny! Cut it out!" She says in between laughter. He stops tickling her, sitting down and pulling the small brunette into his lap, putting his arms around her and kissing her forehead.


	3. Leaving Earth

**Present time...**

Ashley walks into her quarters, seeing Carly sound asleep and walks over, nudging the bed, Carly opening her eyes.

"Ashley, I was sleeping." Carly says, yawning.

"Wake your tiny ass up, I need your help with something.'' Ashley says, Carly blowing a raspberry at the older girl and pulling the covers over her head.

"Hey, miss rulebook! It's only the day we leave spacedock and head for the Klingon neutral zone, get your ass up!" Ashley says.

"You're gonna put me in an early grave with the sleep deprivation because of the fighting." Carly says as she sits up, the covers falling off and her slightly messy light brown waves falling to her shoulders, light blonde highlights visible as she gets up and heads to her closet, finding a set of her black and dark grey uniform, one black and two gold pin badges on the red collar.

"Lucky you with those badges, I only have a black one." Ashley says, looking down at the single gold edged black badge on her collar.

"Maybe if you'd listened harder in the academy, you would've made a higher rank." Carly says, going into the bathroom and came back out with her uniform on and some makeup, her usual cat eye look on as well as Gionna walks in, already dressed in her uniform, wearing her usual smokey eye makeup and her curls in a ponytail, completely ignoring Ashley.

"Attention crew. This is your captain. We depart spacedock in thirty minutes, all crew to your stations." Sam says through the ship wide intercom. The girls leave their quarters, Carly thinking about last night. Ashley elbowed Carly right in the ribs, snapping her out of it.

"What the hell was that for?" Carly says, looking at Ashley.

"To tell you that you're following me to the engineering turbolift when you should be heading for the bridge." Ashley says, Carly now noticing the thin yellow lines on the walls, indicating that she'd entered the engineering area when the place she should be had dark red lines.

Carly nods, heading in the opposite direction and seeing the dark red lines, shaking off the last bit of sleepiness but no luck in shaking off the strange dream the night before. She and Jack collide with each other, both falling.

"Sorry Jack. You okay?" Carly says, rubbing her forehead because it collided with Jack's left shoulder. Jack stands up, pulling Carly up to her feet.

"Yeah, no sickbay needed. You'd better get to the bridge before you're late." Jack says, Carly nodding before continuing down the hallway and reaching turboshaft 1.

"Carly, you remember where everything is?" Sam says as Carly enters the bridge at the very top of the saucer section.

"Yes captain." Carly says, Sam noticing the bruise forming on Carly's forehead.

"What happened?" Sam says.

"Collided with Jack and we fell." Carly says.

"Okay." Sam says before turning to face the main screen again, Carly walking across to the tactical panel.

"Ten minutes until departure." The computer voice says.

"And that's fifteen until we're out there." Sam says, looking at the frontal view displayed on the screen.

Carly sets up the controls, pushing her strange dream to the back of her mind for now.

 _'Johnny and I are just friends.'_ Carly thought, Sam looking at her.

"They keep you awake again?" Sam asks.

"No, I just... didn't fall asleep until 2am." Carly says. Sam nods, deciding to let it drop for now. Carly softly sings Tonight Tonight Tonight by Genesis to keep herself awake.

"Good song… played at an important part of my life." Sam says before the screen flashes with the message 'Ready to disengage docking clamps and retract access connection.'

"Send them the go ahead." Sam says, Tyler at the communications panel sending the message.

"The clamps and access are disconnected, captain. Ready to leave dock on your order." Ivory says, sat at the navigations panel.

"Well then. Take us out, manoeuvring thrusters." Sam says before the small yellow thrusters around the ship ignite, the Enterprise slowly moving forward.

"And… engage impulse engines, full impulse until we're at a safe distance." Sam says, Ivory taking the ship away from the planet.

"Course set for the Klingon neutral zone, ready on your command captain." Ivory says, looking back at Sam.

"Engage at warp 8." Sam says, Ivory following her order. The blue areas of the two warp nacelles glowed brightly before the ship seemed to stretch for a second, disappearing and moving at 8 times the speed of light.

Carly looked at the screen, amazed at everything that they were flying past and how it all blended together.

"You've not spent much time at warp?" Sam says after they both went into her ready room.

"No... it's completely different from how it was described at the academy." Carly says, remembering all the times she'd stared at the sky in Los Santos and wonder what's up there.

"Your record said… you were on earth for your whole life until an academy trip to starbase 1, above earth… how'd it feel? Seeing the planet from space for the first time with your own eyes?" Sam says.

"It felt like a completely different world." Carly says, smiling at those memories.

"I never got that chance. I was raised on the U.S.S Venture, my dad's ship… I've always lived in space, I never actually set foot on earth until I was 12, when my dad took me to the academy to join Starfleet." Sam says, remembering the days she'd spent on the galaxy class ship.

Carly glances at a picture of Sam and Trevor, not sure of what to make of Trevor. She finds a picture of herself and her dad, briefly showing it to Sam.

"He looks better than my dad, at least." Sam says, going to her chair behind her desk, turning on the panel of glass that lit up with the computer display.

"There he is. Admiral Trevor Phillips, commanding the U.S.S Venture." Sam says, bringing up a picture of her and Trevor stood in the spacedock moments before the Venture departed for the first time with Trevor as an admiral.

"He looks better there." Carly says, putting her picture away and scratches her right eyebrow when the scar starts itching.

"Of course he does, he had to make his speech. Just like I did and if you ever captain a ship, you'll make a speech at the launch too." Sam says. Carly nods, sitting in an empty chair.

"The scar's seven years old but it still bugs the hell out of me sometimes." Carly says as she stops scratching, Sam seeing it.

"Yeah… they do that." Sam says, pulling back her sleeve and showing Carly a long scar going from her wrist to her elbow.

"Away team was assaulted by Gorn, one took a knife on me. That was… my first ground mission. It was a while before I did any more." Sam says.

"Christ... mine was from a car accident. My mom and dad fought even more after that." Carly says, remembering the countless arguments and how she handled the chaos by causing more when she picked up a phaser pistol and shot someone.

"Yes… 200 year old cars are a lot less safe than your new Vapid Dominator 40s and Weeny Hellbrakes… they all look like classic supercars now. When I was in the academy, I had a Bati 1252." Sam says.

"Motorbikes are easier to handle than cages." Carly says, realizing that she picked up on some of Johnny's behavior towards cars.

"Not sure I'd agree with that… best thing I had was an old 1977 Imponte Phoenix Trans-am. That was damn fun, scared the hell out of anyone who sat in it with me. I'll have to run the program with you in the holodeck at some point. You… do know about holodecks, right?" Sam says. "Carly? You're spacing out again." She says, snapping Carly out of it as they heard arguing between Tyler and Adam.

"Boys, what's wrong?" Carly says into the microphone.

"Adam keeps telling me that I've got a damn channel open. Clearly, I haven't because if I had-" Tyler says before the ship jolts violently, everyone falling over or out of their chairs as the ship came quickly out of warp.

"Jack, what's happened to our warp core?!" Sam says, going into the bridge.

"We've got a leak down here, captain. The safety system took us out of warp when it detected the leak, we need time to find it but we've got no warp drive at the moment. Sorry captain." Jack says, looking at the warp core down in engineering.

"Make it quick, we're in enemy territory here." Sam says before shutting off the intercom.

"Ivory, continue the path at maximum impulse, divert power to the engines." Sam says before Ivory took power from the weapons, changing it's path so that it went to the impulse engines as the ship moved at 240mmps.

"Gionna, where's the backup power?" Carly says.

"That's only activated when a system is out… Sovereign class works differently to most ships." Gionna says, having spent some time on the Enterprise under Picard's command. "Hey, you're not supposed to-" She says before the sound of metal hitting skull caught Carly and Sam's attention.

"Security team to deck 12, sector 29!" Sam says into the intercom.

"On it, captain!" Billy says before he and Clay run out of the room and over to where Gionna is, kicking the door open and finding her on the floor, her head busted open.

"Clay, get her to sickbay." Billy says, Clay picking Gionna up.

"That thing… they can't be back." Gionna says.

"Gionna, what hit you?" Billy asks.

"If I'm right… it was a Borg." Gionna says, Billy and Clay looking shocked and behind that, terrified.


	4. Futile Resistance

"How the hell did a borg get on board the damn ship?!" Sam says.

"Well, it makes sense… the borg broke the warp core so that a nearby borg ship could easily catch up to… and assimilate us." Tyler says.

"Okay… looks like the maiden voyage will be our first main danger. Turn us around, go back to the point where that borg most likely beamed aboard." Sam says, Tyler following the order.

"Damn, that hurt!" Gionna says.

"What the hell happened?" Johnny says, standing up and walking over to them.

"Gionna got ambushed by a borg." Clay says, putting Gionna on one of the beds so the doctor could check on her.

"Must've been the same one that hit me from behind." Johnny says, taking the ice pack off of his head.

"You knew about the borg? Damn it, John! If You'd've told us before, the whole crew and ship wouldn't be in danger now!" Clay says as Britt walks over.

"That looks nasty. I'll get that fixed for you." Britt says, picking up a small spray bottle of fluid, spraying it on Gionna's cut, making the flesh and skin quickly repair itself.

"Why couldn't they have had that when I was attacked?" Gionna says, rubbing her neck where the scar was.

"If I had the equipment, I could make that scar disappear for you." Britt says, putting the spray bottle down.

"Okay. Guys-" Gionna says, stopping Clay and Johnny's argument. "-take it down a few notches, alright?" She finishes, both nodding in agreement. Billy gently rubs Gionna's back to calm her down like he normally does when she gets a headache. "The thing hit me with a damn crowbar!" She says.

"Crowbar? That doesn't sound normal for a borg, it didn't even try to assimilate you." Clay says.

"Yeah, thank god. I don't want any borg cybernetic parts in my body." Gionna says, cringing as she remembers seeing a picture of a borg in the academy.

"Lie down, you could have a concussion." Britt says, helping Gionna lie back on the bed and straps a blood pressure cuff on Gionna's right arm, pressing the button and recording it as 150/100. "That's a little high. You've been under stress lately?' She says.

"Try living with Ashley as a roommate. She causes stress." Gionna says, Johnny swatting Gionna's left leg. "Hey!" She says, moving her legs away from Johnny's hands.

"What? You were mouthing off, kiddo." Johnny says.

"I think it's to be expected when there's a half man half machine running around the ship." Gionna says. Johnny looks at the monitor and sees that Gionna's blood pressure hasn't gone down, which startled him because aside from the Morphine allergy, Gionna's completely healthy.

"Okay, that's not good. Something else bugging you?" Johnny says, Gionna nodding no a little quickly. She didn't want Johnny to know that the nightmares are back.

"I just… Johnny, this borg terrifies me. I don't want to be brainwashed and made a half machine drone." Gionna says.

Johnny pulls Gionna into his arms, hugging her. Carly and Tyler walk in, arguing with each other.

"You hit me with a baseball bat, Tyler!" Carly says, rubbing her face.

"I didn't know that it was you!" Tyler says, Johnny and Gionna letting go and looking at them.

"Tyler, why'd you hit Carly? She's half your size." Johnny says.

"I thought she was the borg!" Tyler says defensively.

"Jackass!" Carly says, startling Tyler.

"Easy, mouthy one." Johnny says as Britt walks over to Carly, seeing a hell of a bruise on the left side of Carly's face, right under her eye.

"Stay still." Britt says, moving a medical tool across the bruise, making it fade and disappear.

"Nothing broken, thank god. That'd take a bit longer to fix. To think that 300 years ago, they were having casts for just a broken wrist." Britt says.

Carly tries to speak but her face and mouth are numb because of the spray, concerning Britt.

"Nerves are damaged from wisdom teeth removal when you were 16." Britt says, remembering Carly's medical chart. Carly nods, her tongue tingling.

"How long... until the side effects... wear off-" Carly says, elbowing Tyler when he starts laughing.

"Not long, about 15 minutes… the spray, I mean." Britt says.

Carly nods, walking over to Johnny and Clay.

"You okay kid?" Clay says, Carly nodding, balling her right hand into a fist and wanting to punch Tyler but Johnny wraps his hand around Carly's wrist, Carly unclenching her hand.

"Captain?" Gionna says, pressing communicator badge.

"Ivory's got it under control, how are you?" Sam says.

"I'm okay. Tyler hit Carly with a baseball bat." Gionna says.

"Why'd he do that?! She's half his size!" Sam says.

"Well, he said he thought she was the borg." Gionna says.

"And how does a tiny 20 year old, dressed in an undamaged starfleet uniform look like a borg? Never mind, tell her to get back to the bridge when she's fixed up." Sam says.

"Got it-" Gionna says, Tyler yelling in the background "-shut it, Tyler!" She says, throwing a styrofoam cup at Tyler's head.

"Watch the temper, kid!" Tyler says. Carly yells at Tyler as the effects start to wear off.

"Next time, I'm bashing your fucking head in!" Carly yells before they walk away and down the hallway, back into the bridge. "Sorry about the language, captain.'' She says, sitting down.

"It's alright. Just don't be so loud about it-" Sam says before the ship jolts violently, the most terrifying sight appearing in front of them. A borg cube, over 4000 meters on all faces, black with green patches.

"Captain… we're being hailed." Tyler says after sitting back down.

"On screen. This is captain Sam Phillips of-" Sam says, interrupted by a loud, low synthetic voice.

"Captain Sam Phillips, U.S.S Enterprise 1701 E. You have been chosen to replace Locutus." The voice says.

"Okay… Locutus, he was a bad move so tell me, what makes you think that my crew is any different to his?" Sam says, Carly quietly bringing up the file on Locutus to her screen, finding that it was captain Picard, the previous captain of the Enterprise, who got assimilated by the borg to become a method of the borg communicating with other races.

"Your biological and technological distinctiveness will be added to our own. You will become like us." The voice says.

Carly had a bad feeling about this, Tyler poking her shoulder and snapping her out of it. "Not now, Tyler.'' Carly says.

"Prepare for assimilation." The voice says before a borg unit beams into the bridge, a mechanical arm aiming a small rapidly spinning saw at anyone it saw. Tyler pulls out his phaser pistol, turning it to maximum setting and firing the orange beam at the borg, vaporizing it.

At the same time, another beamed in behind Sam, stabbing a needle into her neck before she and the borg beamed away together, both now on the cube.

"Captain! Okay… this is not good." Tyler says before looking at Carly.

"Carly… you're the next highest ranking officer on the ship so… it's you who now takes command until Sam is back." Tyler says.

"Ivory, where was Sam taken to?" Carly says as she sits down in the captain's chair.

"About 500 meters into the ship… looks like a power area but it's shielded so we can't beam in there until we disable the shields." Ivory says.

"Do it, we need to rescue our captain!" Carly says before pressing the intercom button. "Attention, crew members, Captain Phillips has been kidnapped!" She says.

"Carly, we can't teleport in there. If we try, the signal will bounce off the shield and the people in transport will end up in space." Tyler says.

"Take over, I've got an idea.'' Carly says, letting Tyler take over before heading to the screen and hacking into the cube's computer system, disabling the security alarms. "Thank you Lester." She says, remembering how Lester taught her about hacking.

"Right then, their shields are temporarily down. Ivory, come with me. We're going to get Sam back." Carly says, Ivory getting up and following her to the turbolift, both of them reaching the teleporter room.

The blue sparks and lights faded, revealing a dark, black walkway area, lit up by green circuits in the walls.

"Well… welcome to borg land." Ivory says.

Carly nods as she and Ivory stay low, walking around undetected. Ivory finds an air vent, boosting Carly up so she can unscrew the bolts and pull the vent open, climbing up and pulling Ivory up, Ivory closing the vent.

As they dropped out of the other side, Carly turns to see multiple borg working on the walls, her hand flying to her mouth to stop herself screaming.

"Just walk calmly through them. They won't attack unless they see us as threats." Ivory says, Carly nodding before the two slowly walk through the borg, the workers looking at them but not attacking.

 _'This is not what I imagined what would've happened the first time.'_ Carly thought as she and Ivory continue to walk around, hearing two of the borgs argue.

"It's not my fault he hit that kid!" One yells in an electronic voice.

"Okay… arguing borg, that's new." Ivory says, guiding Carly past the two borg workers and into a large room, multiple borg stood in sleep mode around the room.

"Sam!" Carly says as she sees Sam stood up a corridor, side on to Carly. Sam slowly turns to look at Carly, shocking her and Ivory as Sam shows a large mechanical implant on the side of her face, a red light coming from it on a rotating small camera. Sam starts walking towards them, raising an assimilated arm with multiple small saw wheels on it. Ivory did the only thing he could, pressing Carly's rank badges and activating an emergency transporter, the two of them teleporting back to the Enterprise bridge.

"We're too late..." Carly says, Ivory hugging her. The screen changes, showing Sam, her skin very pale and stretched at the edges of the cybernetic parts in her face.

"I am Lorentos of borg. Resistance is futile. You will all be assimilated into the new order." Sam says, her voice flat with no emotion.

"Screw that!" Ivory says as he and Carly let go. Ivory turned the Enterprise, heading back towards Earth at maximum warp. It wasn't long before they came out of warp, going towards the station at half impulse.

"But… that's gone… that's Sam… gone." Carly says, trying to hold back tears but failing before the cube exits transwarp right near the station, holding the Enterprise with a tractor beam.

"Resistance of any kind is futile and pointless. You will be assimilated or destroyed." Sam's voice says, echoing across the station.

"I was hoping that I'd never have to do this!" Carly says, hitting multiple buttons on her tactical panel despite Ivory and Tyler telling her not to.

The Enterprise fired five quantum torpedoes and three phaser beams, all hitting the cube in different places. Starbase 1 also fired at the cube as well as every ship in the area. The moment the cube went up, Sam teleported into the bridge, falling back on the captain's chair. One of her cybernetic parts sticking out of her leg tore a hole in the leather.

"Sam?!" Carly says, seeing a more alive look on Sam's face.

"I feel… almost… human." Sam says, out of breath. She sees that the weapons have been fired and looks at Carly.

"You getting kidnapped and assimilated counts as an emergency." Carly says, Sam nodding.

"Yes… now can someone… help me to the starbase sickbay? They can… remove these… painful parts." Sam says, cringing in pain as she started feeling the mechanical parts embedded in her skin, organs and bones. Ivory picks Sam up, taking her out of the bridge while Tyler pulls Carly aside.

"I made a decision, Tyler! I had no choice!" Carly says.

"It's just… you were about to willingly kill her. And that there just proves that inside every borg… the previous being is still in there, still trapped." Tyler says.

"Yeah... come on, let's go find the others." Carly says before they leave.


	5. Slow Recovery

"Captain?" Carly says as she enters Sam's quarters, seeing Sam stood there staring out of the window into the endless void of space, a glass of warm milk in her hand. Carly looked at the patches of synthetic skin on the side of Sam's face where the borg parts had been.

"I was in your position once... made the same decision. I'm glad it worked out better than last time." Sam says.

"Yeah… you're alive and human." Carly says, standing next to Sam. Behind the shell, Sam was traumatized. Every time she closed her eyes, she was there, seeing the borg drilling into her body and her blood being sucked by tubes.

"Carly… they're all still in there. All the borg still hold their emotions and they're screaming." Sam says.

"Tyler said the same thing... I'm so sorry, Captain." Carly says, feeling like she failed to stop this from happening.

"Hey. You were okay. You went beyond your call just going in there to get me, then you saved the earth from the cube. And when it's just us… you can call me Sam." Sam says, drinking some more of her warm milk.

"Okay... Sam." Carly says, sitting down.

"You look exhausted. Go get some rest, Tyler and Ivory have everything controlled." Sam says, placing a hand on Carly's shoulder and brushing her other hand against Carly's face, brushing Carly's tears away. Carly nods, standing up and leaving, walking back to her quarters, finding Johnny but no sign of Gionna and Ashley.

"Where'd they go?" Carly says, closing the door.

"To talk... I hope that they call a truce." Johnny says, patting the couch and letting Carly sit down next to him.

"I hope so too." Carly says, tears falling again but she brushes them away, still feeling the warmth Sam's hand left on her face.

"You made the best decision you could, Carly. I've never seen anyone so brave and anyone who doesn't like it can keep their mouths shut." Johnny says, rubbing his hand up and down Carly's back. Carly rests her head on Johnny's shoulder, letting him comfort her.

"I just… I could've killed her and she was still in there… they all were." Carly says.

"She's alive... it's okay." Johnny says as Carly closes her eyes for a few seconds, fighting sleep but yawning.  
"Carly, get some rest. I'm not leaving your side." He says, Carly nodding before drifting into sleep, Johnny putting a blanket over Carly.

"John?" Jack says as he walks in, seeing Carly asleep. "She hasn't been sleeping much lately." He says, remembering when Carly snuck into his quarters.

 **3 days earlier...**

Jack heard someone walk in and sits up, seeing Carly in a V rock cropped off shoulder shirt and grey and white plaid pajama pants.

"Couldn't sleep… it's all new, this ship." Carly says, looking at the walls, their dark grey and black theme very different from what she was used to.

"How'd you-" Jack says, Carly revealing her switchblade. "Oh."  
He says.

"Yeah... Ivory's a habitual sleepwalker, isn't he?" Carly says, putting her switchblade away.

"Yeah. Come here, I ain't gonna bite you." Jack says as Carly walks over to Jack's bed, sitting down. Before they could say anything, they heard shouting from Gionna and Ashley.

"My roommates never stop arguing." Carly says, Jack placing his hand on her back and rubbing it. Jack and Carly had grown up in dysfunctional families so they were used to fighting and loud noise.

"Hey, someone picked the lock-" Ivory says as he walks in, seeing Carly and Jack.

"Oh… sorry, was I… interrupting?" Ivory says, about to leave again.

"No... I should really-" Carly says before Jack wraps his hand around her wrist.

"Ivory, for the last time, there's nothing going on between me and Carly." Jack says.

"Yeah... and replicators sound like ponies." Ivory says sarcastically, smiling before returning to his bed.

"Try not to make too much noise when you get at it, I want to sleep." Ivory says, lying on his side.

"He'll never grow up." Jack says, pulling the covers down so Carly can lie down next to him.

"No, he won't… I struggle to think of a good enough reason for him to be on the Federation flagship but here he is." Carly says.

Ivory looks at them as Jack readjusts the covers, Carly's head on the other pillow and Jack brushing Carly's hair out of her face.

"Nothing going on between you two... keep telling yourselves that." Ivory says.

"Shut it, you twat!" Jack says, Carly trying not to laugh.

"Well don't worry, I won't look… doesn't mean I won't listen and please myself at the same time." Ivory says. Carly blew a raspberry at Ivory, flipping him off jokingly. "Wiseass." He says.

"Just try not to do that around the captain. I hear that the last person who flipped her off ended up with a one way first class ticket to the airlock." Jack says.

"I'll try. Goodnight Jack." Carly says before they close their eyes. Ivory watched them sleep for a few minutes before dozing off as well, thinking that he'll be woken up by them soon.

Present time...

Jack walked back into his quarters after a while, Ivory looking at him.

"Carly ain't with you tonight, little bro?" Ivory says as Jack closes the door.

"She's asleep in her own quarters, Johnny's keeping an eye on her." Jack says, Ivory putting his phaser pistol down and standing up, surprised.

"You don't seem too jealous, I know you like her." Ivory says, Jack smiling a little.

"Well… yeah, she's cute but… I just like someone else in that way." Jack says, trying to hide his smile as Ivory slowly worked it out.

"You like the captain!" Ivory shouts, Jack no longer able to suppress his smile.

"Yes and can you keep your voice down?! Besides, you're the one who won't tell Gionna how you feel about her, Ivory." Jack says.

"Oh… shut up. But hey, the captain's got a nice ass for you." Ivory says, smirking.

"Yeah, well-" Jack says before Gionna runs in, closing and locking the automated sliding halves of the door. She turned around, scratches on her face and blood trickling down her mouth.

"Oh my… Tracey?" Jack says, Gionna nodding.

"Yeah... I didn't even do anything, she just started scratching and hitting me." Gionna says, holding up her right hand, Tracey's tooth stuck in one of the cuts.

"You punched her so hard that you knocked a tooth out?!" Ivory says in disbelief as he helps Gionna sit down, Jack finding a medkit.

"She's lucky that I didn't pull my phaser on her. Screaming about Luis and that I need to stay away from him! I barely even know the guy!" Gionna says.

"Luis Lopez… he's in the warp core area, with me." Jack says. He grabs the tweezers, yanking Tracey's tooth out of Gionna's finger and throwing the tooth away. Gionna stayed completely quiet as Jack patched up her injuries.

'This is insanity! Why am I always getting attacked by crazy people?!' Gionna thought. Tracey's jealousy had gotten out of control and Gionna knew that it wouldn't be the last time.

"Gionna… maybe we should all talk to the captain about this, it's gone too far. If the captain knows about it then she's well entitled to have Tracey transferred off the ship. And it's best to do it now, while we're still docked at the earth starbase." Ivory says.

"Yeah... let's do it before we lose our minds." Gionna says as she stands up, following them out of the room and to the captain's quarters, Jack pressing the ringer.

"Come in." Sam says, Jack pressing the button to open the door.

"Well, what can I do for you three?" Sam says, putting down her coffee and sitting up straight.

"Captain..." Gionna says, Sam seeing the younger girl's injuries.

"When you're done here, I'd recommend getting Britt to check that in sickbay. She's the medical chief now." Sam says.

"Okay...Tracey just went crazy and attacked me, screaming about how-" Gionna says before the ringer sounds again.

"Yes?" Sam says before Tracey walks in, glaring at Gionna.

"Tracey, is what I hear true?" Sam asks, taking a sip from her coffee.

"She shouldn't be fucking my boyfriend!" Tracey yells, blood coming from where her lateral incisor used to be.

"Okay, firstly watch the language and secondly, I've always held a rule. Romantic relationships are okay on my ship as long as they don't interfere with your work and they don't cause conflict, both of which are being completely ignored right now." Sam says, bringing up something on her screen.

"Luis and I barely know each other. We talk sometimes, that's it." Gionna says calmly, infuriating Tracey.

"Bullshit! You two are fucking and-" Tracey yells.

"Cut it out! Now! Both of you, you're like kids!" Sam shouts, both girls going quiet.

"Now. There's a few options open here. Best one is that you two either settle your differences or I move you to seperate rooms and you ignore each other. Otherwise, someone's getting transferred, understood?" Sam says.

"Yes, captain." Gionna says, Tracey still quiet.

"Now, I don't know what made you two hate each other and quite frankly, I'm not bothered. Just make sure it doesn't affect anything on my ship and we're okay. When you're not on board or not working, feel free to slap, punch and bite all you want. Just not during work, and certainly not on the Enterprise." Sam says.

Tracey walks out, her face neutral but she was still madder than hell and went straight to Carly's quarters to vent to her about it, pressing the ringer but received no response.

"Carly?" Tracey says, pressing the ringer again. A sleepy groan caught her attention as the sliding door opens, Johnny standing there and motioning to Carly, who was sound asleep in her bed.

"The hell are you doing here?" Tracey asks.

"Keeping an eye on her, she wasn't feeling too good after seeing the captain's face." Johnny says, Tracey nodding.

"Yeah… the synthetic skin patches don't exactly look nice. But they're better than borg implants." Tracey says.

"Hey, what happened to your tooth?" Johnny says.

"Uh... just a misunderstanding... I need to apologize to the other girl." Tracey says, walking away. Johnny closes the sliding door and walks over to Carly, lying down next to her and rubbing his hand up and down her back.

 **Meanwhile...**

"What is it with other girls trying to kill you?" Britt says, spraying the medical spray on Gionna's cuts and making them disappear. Gionna was about to respond but Luis walks in and Gionna looks away from him, Luis walking over to her and asking if they can talk.

"Tracey gets crazy sometimes." Luis says.

'Crazy's an understatement.' Gionna thought, running her fingers over the scar on her neck. Luis rests his hand on Gionna's shoulder, getting her to look at him.

"Damn we need girl book.'" Tracey says as she thought of life off the ship.

"What you two need is to stop trying to kill each other." Luis says as Tracey walks in.

"What I could use is a decent night's sleep." Gionna says before leaving them to talk. She puts her earbuds in and presses the MP3 app on her phone,  
CCR's Born On The Bayou playing and calming her down. She turned the corner and was grabbed by a masked person, him pinning her against the wall and putting his right hand on her mouth as he grabbed a knife, pressing it to her scar.

"No struggles or that thing comes back, understood?!" The attacker says before being grabbed from behind, pulled off of Gionna by a man who was holding the attacker with a single hand.

"Greetings. I am Data." The man says before jamming a finger in the attacker's area between their neck and shoulder, the attacker falling unconscious afterwards. Data turned, reaching a hand out to Gionna and helping her up, Gionna pulling her earbuds out and shutting her MP3 app off, stuffing both items in her uniform pocket.

"I frown on violence in this ship, I've served on it since it was first commissioned." Data says.

"I... I don't know how he..." Gionna says, Data putting his hand on her shoulder.

"I believe he hacked into the system and decided that you were the most… aesthetically pleasing crewmember he could reach. You'll be glad to know that it's landed him a boot off the ship for certain." Data says. Gionna nods, shaken up.

"Thank you." Gionna says before turning around and walking away, stopping at Terry's quarters and pressing the ringer. "Terry?" She manages to say, Terry opening the sliding door and pulling her into the room, closing the door and turning the lights on, seeing tears in Gionna's eyes.

"Gionna, what happened?!" Terry says, wrapping his arms around Gionna to try and calm her down.

"He... He found me again..." Gionna says, tears falling down her face as she hangs onto Terry.

"Did… did he…" Terry says, Gionna shaking her head.

"No… that guy, Data… he stopped him." Gionna says.

"Data's an android…" Terry says before making Gionna sit down.

"I... I saw Johnny kill... at least I thought he killed the guy-" Gionna says, jumping out of her skin when the door ringer sounds. Terry walks over, opening the sliding door and letting Billy in.

"What happened?!" Billy says, closing and locking the door before him and Terry walk over to Gionna.

"The son of a bitch found her again!" Terry says.

"That's it, we're gonna-" Billy says.

"No! No, I can't!" Gionna says, tears falling heavily.

"The best option is to tell the captain. If we kill this guy on the ship, we're gonna get transferred to a crappy cargo runner faster than we can think." Terry says.

"He keeps coming back! He won't stop!" Gionna screams, tears falling heavily. Terry wraps his arms around her, cradling her close to him and stroking her hair.

"Okay... we don't have to tell her now but you're not leaving our sight." Terry says, Gionna sniffling. Eventually, Gionna wore herself out from crying, falling asleep in Terry's arms as Terry gently picked her up and puts her in his bed, pulling the covers over her.

"How... how did he find her?! I thought that Johnny killed him!" Billy says.

"Yeah and think… we all thought the borg had disappeared. We all thought that the Klingons wouldn't attack but both of those happened." Terry says.

"The whole quadrant's going to hell recently… all started with the destruction of Enterprise C, at the edge of the Delta Quadrant." Billy says.

"We can't kill him and she's too traumatized to tell anyone..." Terry says, Billy nodding in agreement.

"She's gonna be in total fear with the guy back and on the ship… we need to either take him out or get him off the ship in time for departing spacedock." Billy says.

Terry nods, feeling Gionna's hand grab his and squeezes it, leaning in and kissing her on her forehead. Both men agreed that they needed to find Johnny and tell him what happened.


	6. Past And Present Collide PT1

Sam laid down on the hard metal table, her mind neutralized and seemingly in someone else's control. Around her, two borg workers attached parts to her, one attaching a battle arm while the other connected the new parts to Sam's brain.

After a while of this, a small drill started rapidly spinning, the borg moving it slowly closer and closer to Sam's eye. The drill touched the eyeball...

Sam woke up with a shock, her head shooting up. She felt hot and sweaty so got up, going to the sink and washing cold water over her face. She looked in the mirror, seeing something moving under the skin in her cheek. She gasped, pain shooting through her as a saw-like metal item burst out of her face.

Sam woke up hearing the door ringer, rubbing her eyes before saying "Come in." She got up, getting her regular hot coffee with milk from the food replicator.

"Captain?" Data says as he walks in, closing the sliding door.

"Data, what's wrong?'' Sam says.

"Miss Cipriani was... attacked earlier tonight." Data says, Sam completely alert.

"Is she at the sickbay?!" Sam says.

"I don't know. She's sure that it's the same guy who attacked her last time." Data says.

"And… the attacker is still on the ship?" Sam asks.

"I put him in a holding cell. He's still unconscious." Data says before Sam presses the intercom button.

"Which cell is he in, Francis?" Sam says.

"Cell 7." Francis says, Sam nodding before she and Data head to the brig and to the cell.

"You think it's okay to attack my crew members?!'' Sam says, the guy sitting up and keeping the mask on but looking at her. He didn't speak, smirking at her instead.

"Okay, listen. I'm well entitled to throw you out the airlock at a moments notice and right now, I'd be more than happy to do that! So tell me, politely, why'd you try to attack Gionna a second time?" Sam says.

"That little slut wanted it then and she wants it now." The guy says.

"No woman wants to be forced!" Sam says, the guy laughing. "Throw him in the airlock, Data.'' She says, the laughter stopped and replaced by anger.

"You think that I won't find her again, Captain Phillips?!" The guy yells, startling Sam.

"This is pointless." Sam says, starting to walk away.

"Ignore me and you'll get everyone on this ship killed!" The guy shouts, Sam stopping and turning around to him.

"Go on. I'm listening." Sam says, the guy sitting on the bed.

"You've been given a shipment of 80 mark 5 quantum torpedoes as part of your repairs. I suggest you open one up." The guy says, Sam considering what he was saying.

"Give me a reason to listen to you, to even consider what you're telling me." Sam says.

"I can give you 80. And they're on board your ship." The guy says before Sam leaves.

 **Early the next morning...**

"Carly, it's Billy. Is Johnny in there with you?" Billy says, pressing the ringer again. The door opens and Carly sees the look on Billy's face.

"What happened?!" Carly says as Billy walks in, Johnny opening his eyes and sitting up.

"Gionna's attacker… he's back." Billy says. Johnny woke up completely, pure rage in his eyes.

"Where's the son of a bitch?!" Johnny says, standing up and walking to the door but Billy stops him, knowing what Johnny's going to do.

"Johnny, you kill him and you'll get us all off the ship in a moment. The captain's got him locked in the brig, he told her something and she's listening to him." Billy says.

Johnny growls angrily, walking over to Terry's quarters, Billy and Carly following as Terry opens the door, letting them in. Gionna was staring at the ceiling like she wasn't even there and Johnny walks over, sitting down and placing his hand on her arm, Gionna flinching and backing up towards the wall, a terrified look in her eyes.

"It's okay baby. He's not here." Johnny says, Gionna blinking her tears away. Johnny pulls Gionna into his arms, gently rubbing his hand up and down her back.

"Wh… where is he?" Gionna asks, her voice shaky.

"Captain put him in the brig… I'm afraid to say she's actually listening to what he's saying." Johnny says.

"He keeps coming back... Johnny, he's gonna find me again." Gionna says, Johnny gently stroking her hair.

"As long as I breathe, he won't get anywhere near you. And he's in the brig so he's not getting out without being released… whatever his name is." Johnny says.

Gionna nodded, burying her face into Johnny's shoulder as the door ringer sounds again and Carly opens it, brushing her own tears away as Jack looks at her.

"Jack..." Carly says, Jack walking in and seeing Gionna.

"You guys… this attacker's worse than we ever thought." Jack says, closing the door.

 **An hour ago…**

"Jack, we're about to open a quantum torpedo and if we're not careful we could blow up the whole cargo bay so concentrate." Sam says as she and Jack kneel either side of a mark 5 quantum torpedo.

"Right… opening the outer shell." Jack says before the casing opened, revealing a plain metal container inside.

"That's not right… there should be the quantum release here, not whatever… oh god." Sam says, suddenly remembering a certain part in the academy's book of starfleet's history.

"Captain?" Jack says before the metal case opens, revealing a glass tube full of frost and ice, a young woman inside in deep sleep.

"These are cryo chambers… and him in the brig… his name is Khan… remember the history, he was the guy who attacked Kirk's enterprise with the admiral's ship… he's back." Sam says, staring with wide eyes at the cryo tube.

"But… why hide them in the torpedoes?" Jack asks.

"To sneak them out. Starfleet would never allow a single one of them to leave the warehouse after the Khan incident so someone must've… there were 72 chambers, they put Khan in one so where'd the chamber's previous occupant go? He must've let Khan out, now Khan's trying to get his people away by sneaking them aboard the Enterprise." Sam says, Jack now looking slightly worried.

"So… Gionna's attacker is Khan and he's using the Enterprise as his method of hopping his people across to some planet… what do we do?" Jack says, Sam thinking for a moment.

"We do like Kirk… we follow what he says, then we turn on him at some point… though I was hoping to do it more peacefully, maybe drop him and his people on an inhabited planet somewhere they'll be able to live like they wanted… but the problem is, that means listening to, and helping Khan." Sam says.

"Right… well, I guess you know best, captain. If it's okay, I'd like to go check on Gionna." Jack says, standing up.

"Go on… I need time to think." Sam says, Jack nodding before heading away.

 **Present time.**

"...So she's really considering helping him." Jack finishes. Gionna breathes heavily, balling her hands up into fists as Johnny stops her from heading to the door. She was scared the first time this happened but now she was enraged and ready to kill.

"Gionna, stop and think this through. You kill Khan, you're gonna make an enemy of the captain and get us all thrown off the ship and if that happens, we can kiss goodbye to a promising career in Starfleet." Johnny says, his hands on Gionna's shoulders to stop her going.

"That prick attacked me twice! I'm not letting him do it again!" Gionna yells, Jack grabbing a syringe and filling it with a sedative. "No, Jack! Don't you-" She says, Jack sticking the syringe in her arm and injecting the sedative into Gionna's body, making her scream.

"I… hate old style needles." Gionna says, calming down.

"I agree. Sickbay's tiny ones use a quick anesthetic so you don't feel the needle going in." Johnny says, holding Gionna and pulling her into a hug. Gionna's eyes slide close, the sedative taking effect and Jack throwing the syringe away as Johnny puts Gionna on the bed.

"I didn't think that I'd ever have to do that to her." Jack says softly to Carly, who nods. She didn't talk much when she got angry. Jack gently put his hand on Carly's back, rubbing it.

"We just keep her away from him until this is over with." Carly says, the rational part of her kicking in.

"Yeah or the captain gets us all killed." Ivory says, closing the door behind him.

"Okay… I know you have trust issues but come on! Sam is one of the best captains in starfleet, given her own ship at just 20." Jack says.

"Can you two dickheads not argue for once?! We've got more important things to handle!" Carly yells, startling everyone who was awake in the room.  
Jack and Ivory nod, Carly opening the sliding door and walking into the corridor. Terry stays next to Gionna so Johnny can follow Carly and try to calm her down.

Johnny found Carly sitting down on the floor with her eyes closed, her back against the wall and sits down next to her, putting his hand on her shoulder.  
She reminded him of Gionna when she stopped sleeping and took caffeine pills to stay awake.

"Carly... this isn't like you. You don't lash out at people." Johnny says, Carly opening her eyes.

"It's just… so much has happened. Captain got assimilated, Gionna's attacker came back who turns out to be Khan, the most dangerous thing captain Kirk ever faced… and Sam's really cooperating with Khan." Carly says.  
"I... when I was younger, I couldn't sleep after the car crash... I wasn't myself for a long time." She says, remembering how her mom would treat her and what finally made her snap.

 **4 years ago, De Santa residence...**

'Another rough day...' Carly thought as she walked into the house, ready to go upstairs and take her North LS high uniform off. She hated the damn thing but not as much as she hated the school itself. She heard her mom call her name but ignored it, walking upstairs.

"Carly Jade!" Amanda says from the bottom of the stairs.

"What now?!" Carly says irritably, stopping halfway.

"What the hell is this?!" Amanda says, Carly turning to see Amanda holding up the response to Carly's application for Starfleet Academy.

"My way out of this house. You don't want me around, you've already made that clear." Carly says calmly, shocking Amanda.

"I want you around, you're just a difficult kid to deal with!" Amanda says.

"Most parents try to talk to their children when they're going through hell, you just pretend that I'm not here!" Carly says.

"Carly… alright, I don't want you around but that doesn't mean going to Starfleet, then going and getting yourself killed millions of miles from home and earth!" Amanda says. Carly choked back a sob and Amanda realizes that she went too far. Her youngest one rarely cried, similar to Michael.

"Mom… look around you. It's the 24th century, only five years until the 25th. Going into space and being light years away from earth is a normal part of life. Hell, humans have been living on other planets for 200 years. Now give me my application and let me live my life how I want." Carly says.

Amanda thought for a moment before walking into the living room with the papers, grabbing Carly's phaser pistol and throwing the paper down on the floor.

"No!" Carly yells before Amanda fires the phaser, the paper catching fire. Carly quickly picked it up, waving it around quickly until the flames died out, a few centimeters of the corner burnt off. Carly goes to Amanda, angrily snatching the phaser and pointing it at her.

"Carly..." Amanda says.

"I'm going! You don't like it, that's your problem!" Carly yells, rage in her eyes as Michael walks in, taking the phaser pistol from Carly.

"Okay, what the hell is happening this time?" Michael says.

"Only our daughter signing up to get her ass killed off in space on some starship!" Amanda shouts.

"I know, I said it's okay and she won't get killed!" Michael says, seeing the burnt edge of the application. "You'll do anything to break Carly, won't you?" He says, shocking Amanda.

"I… no! Listen, you remember Brad. His friend's girl got killed a quarter of the way around the galaxy! I just don't want that happening to Carly!" Amanda says.

"Yeah, so you can continue to yell at her. No. Sorry Amanda, she's got her own life to live and if she wants to spend it on starships, that's nothing for you to decide." Michael says.

Tracey comes out of her room as Carly runs upstairs, slipping but braces herself against the railing to keep from falling. "Damn ankle!" Carly mutters.

"Carly, you'll never get anywhere in the academy being that clumsy. I on the other hand, will excel and have my own ship while you're sweeping the HQ building." Tracey says, Carly seeing her form stamped with 'ACCEPTED'.

"Yeah... you'll be good. Good at fucking the instructors to get a pass." Carly says, angering Tracey.

"You've got that lip sis, but you just wait until Admiral Tracey orders your ass into a dirty 50 year old freight runner!" Tracey shouts.

"Looks like I hit a nerve. Good because you'll never get anywhere in life without hard work. You're not doing yourself any favors by being a whore, Tracey." Carly says, smirking. Tracey swung at Carly but she dodged it, letting Tracey fall down the stairs. "Whoops! Now who's clumsy?" She says.

"You fuck! You'll never make it through the academy, I'll swear by it!" Tracey yells, rubbing her head where it hit the flowerpot on the stair corner.

"Enjoy your concussion. Oh and Jack and Ivory are coming along too. You remember them, right?" Carly says.

"Caroline… fuck off!" Tracey says, shouting at the end.

"Wow, I did hit a nerve." Carly says as Amanda and Michael run upstairs, seeing Tracey. "Oh, hi Amanda." She says when Amanda glares at her. Carly walks into her room, seeing Jack sneaking in through the window. "And hello to you, Jack." She says, Jack concerned.

"Well, me and Ivory both got accepted. Tracey?" Jack says.

"Unfortunately." Carly says, looking at her application and also seeing the word 'ACCEPTED' stamped in green.  
"And so did I." She says, showing Jack the application.

"And then your bitch of a mother tries to burn it. Well, I bet you're glad to be getting away from this shithole." Jack says.

"Damn right I am!" Carly says as Jack hugs her, picking her up and spinning her around for a few seconds. "Hey... what do you say to going to a movie to celebrate?" She says.

"Since it's Starfleet, how about that new one about the crew of a ship getting stuck falling towards a star?" Jack says.

"Sounds perfect.'' Carly says, kissing Jack on the cheek as he puts her back on the ground.

 **Present time...**

Ashley walked around, trying to clear her mind and saw Johnny and Carly on the floor, hearing them talk to each other. She was about to walk over to them when Tracey grabs her, pulling her back into the other corridor.

"Hey, I'm not gonna hurt Carly!" Ashley says.

"Too bad, because I'm going to." Tracey says, smirking. Ashley grabs the blonde's arm tightly, stopping her.

"Not on my watch, you won't! Get back to your quarters before you end up mopping floors in the bathrooms!" Ashley says, startling Tracey.

"Who the hell do you think you are?!" Tracey says.

"Someone looking out for her roommates after what happened last night! Get your ass out of here!" Ashley says. She and Gionna had talked things out and decided not to fight anymore.

"Oh, you backstabbing-" Tracey says, interrupted by the ship-wide intercom.

"Attention crew. We are departing spacedock in 15 minutes. Everyone please go to your stations." Sam says through the intercom.

"Back to work." Carly says as she and Johnny stand up. Johnny rubs Carly's back for a second before leaving, Carly walking in the opposite direction but Ashley stops her, rubbing Carly's arm.

"In times of crisis, everyone needs to stick together. We'll be okay." Ashley says, Carly nodding. Gionna walks out of the room sleepily, Terry taking her in the direction of the sickbay.

"Carly. Ready room, need to talk with you for a minute." Sam says as Carly enters the bridge. Carly sets everything up before looking at Sam, trying to keep calm. Carly follows Sam into the ready room, Sam sitting down behind the desk. Carly remembered that the ready room was pretty much a smaller, temporary quarters for the captain to be in, the bridge only a door away.

"Carly… you've proven yourself a brilliant officer, trying to save your comrades but also following the rulebook. If anything, I'd say I'm proud." Sam says.

Carly nods, still feeling guilty. Sam stands up, walking over to Carly and placing her hands on Carly's shoulders.

"The reason I called you in here… was because I'd like to offer you promotion to first officer." Sam says, revealing a gold pin badge to replace Carly's black one alongside her two gold ones.

"Sam... thank you." Carly says, Sam replacing the black badge with the gold one on her collar.

"Right then. Come on, number one. We've got a ship to run." Sam says, going back to the bridge and revealing that Carly's tactical control panel had been moved to the chair to the left of the captain's.

Tyler glances at Carly's badge, shocked and slightly angry.

"Right then. Take your seat and… tell you what, you do the honours." Sam says, Carly sitting down in the first officer's chair. On the right side of Sam was Ari, the ship's counsellor who nodded to Carly upon seeing the new badge.

"Disengage docking clamps." Carly says, Ivory doing so.

"Starbase 1 control, this is Enterprise ready to exit dock." Carly says when Tyler opens the channel.

"Copy Enterprise, opening docking bay doors. You are clear to proceed." The controller says.

"Reverse thrusters, turn us around when we're at a safe distance from the station area." Carly says, Ivory reversing the ship out of the dock before turning it around, the whole 700 meter long Enterprise now facing the open bay doors.

"Take us out, Ivory… you pick the speed." Carly says, Ivory moving the ship forward and out of the station at one eighths impulse. The hip emerged from the station, Ivory increasing to half impulse until they reached a safe distance.

"And set course for Deep Space Nine, warp 7… engage." Carly says before Ivory turns the ship in the right direction and enters warp drive.

"Great job." Sam says.

"Thank you captain." Carly says as Ivory glances at Tyler.

"What's wrong Tyler?" Ivory says.

"I... I just didn't expect her to be promoted." Tyler says, trying to hide his anger. He got along with Carly so he couldn't understand why he was angry.


	7. Past And Present Collide PT2

Gionna stared up at the ceiling, lying back on the bed as Britt checked on her, trying to comfort her. She remembered how Picard called her into his quarters one morning and she told him what happened to her when she was 13, what Picard said to her.

"If you ever need someone to talk to or if the nightmares never go away, I'll help you anyway I can. I care about my crew members, Gionna. That includes you."

Gionna flinched when she felt a hand on her shoulder, looking up at seeing Adam.

"Oh... sorry." Gionna says, sitting up.

"It's okay... I heard about last night and... I just wanted to make sure that you're okay." Adam says, sitting down in an empty chair next to Gionna's bed. Britt walks over to Clay as he walks in, telling her that he's okay and just wanted to check on Gionna. Clay walks over, carefully putting his hand on Gionna's shoulder. Adam stands up, walking over to the other bed and checking on Mikey.

"She was just a kid when it..." Mikey says, Adam nodding.

"Are you feeling okay, darling?" Clay says.

"No... I... I can't believe that he found me again." Gionna says softly, Clay gently rubbing her back. He remembers how she was after the first time.

 **8 years ago, Saint Marks, Cipriani house...**

Clay had barely walked up to Gionna when the sleeping girl kicked him in the ribs, stood up and pulled Clay by his arm, yanking him over her shoulder and flinging him across the room, grabbing her phaser pistol and aiming it at Clay.

"Don't shoot, it's me!" Clay says, Gionna turning on the lights.

"Clay, you almost gave me a damn heart attack! Sneaking in through a window's a good way to get yourself shot!" Gionna says, putting the phaser pistol down.

"Just… calm down. That thing's on maximum, you could've vaporized me." Clay says, not mentioning why she was now keeping her phaser on maximum all the time but he knew it was because of the attack.

"I just... get a little on edge sometimes. Started taking karate and self defense classes at the Dojo in Chinatown." Gionna says, Clay standing up and walking over to her, putting his hands on her shoulders.

"Carry on like that, you'll have a fine career in Starfleet security." Clay says.

"Yeah... sorry about-" Gionna says, Clay nodding and helping her sit down. She looked exhausted, Clay seeing that she didn't want to fall back asleep.

"Clay, I told you not to scare the hell outta her!" Johnny says, climbing through the window and closing it, locking it.

"You should've said that she's taking karate and self defense classes, John!" Clay says, surprising Johnny.

"I haven't told anyone about it." Gionna says, yawning sleepily.

"We're staying here, keeping an eye on you so you can sleep." Johnny says.

"I'm not sleepy." Gionna says, trying to stay awake.

"I'm not tired-" Johnny says before making a yawning sound and falling back on the chair, pretending to fall asleep.

"John, that ain't gonna work." Gionna says, Johnny opening his eyes and moving over to the bed, sitting down as Clay stands up and glances out the window, making sure that no one else comes in here.

"You're safe with us baby. We'll always be here to protect you." Johnny says, helping Gionna lie back down and pulling the covers over her as she closes her eyes.

 **Present time...**

"Shh." Clay says, motioning to a sleeping Gionna as Terry walks over to them. Terry nods, brushing Gionna's hair out of her face.

"You know… the people on this ship never cease to surprise me. By birth defect, the captain is actually blind. She's got synthetic eyes." Terry says, quietly sitting in a chair looking out to the many stars shooting by as the ship traveled at 7 times light speed.

"I didn't know that." Clay says as Gionna stirs around, crying out in her sedative induced sleep. Terry kisses Gionna on her forehead, seeing that angry looking scar.

"I hate seeing her like this and him being in the brig doesn't make her feel better." Terry says.

"Neither does the captain cooperating and listening to Khan." Clay says.

"Yeah." Terry says, Gionna's hazel eyes opening slowly. "Hey there sugar." He says, kissing Gionna's forehead.

"Why the hell does that... Khan have to live?... part of me wants to go and yell in the captain's face." Gionna says, rubbing her eyes.

"Yelling might make you feel better but it never solves anything. He ain't gonna get out." Terry says, gently grabbing Gionna's left hand and holding it with his right hand while rubbing her arm with the left. Another scar caught his attention, this one on Gionna's right arm from when it was broken in three places.

That one and the one on her right hip didn't bother her and the one on her hip was from the ship crash a few months back.

"Not again... dysfunctional fools." Gionna says as Packie and Gerry walk in, shouting at each other and covered in bruises. She had grown up with the younger Mcreary siblings and witnessed countless violent fights between Packie and Gerry, as well as Francis and Derrick. Kate's the only one who never got violent but she had witnessed fights like Gionna and had ended up in therapy for a while.

"Oh, so beating the hell outta me makes sense Gerry?!" Packie shouts angrily.

"It makes sense when you make me wreck a fucking phaser pistol!" Gerry shouts, getting right in Packie's face.

"Cut it out, guys!" Gionna says, sitting up carefully. Her back was sore and she had some cracked ribs from being thrown against the wall. Packie and Gerry look at her, the petite brunette staring them down eerily similar to how Castillo did on Miami Vice.

"She scares the hell outta me with that stare." Gerry says, embarrassed of being scared of Gionna when she's angry. Both limp over to Gionna, carefully putting their arms around her one at a time, Gerry resting his hand on Gionna's right shoulder.

"Was Derrick involved this time or was it just you two?" Gionna asks.

"Just us. Derrick's working security with Billy today." Gerry says.

"Sometimes, I wonder just how we all got put on the same ship… it's good but sometimes I think they've signed the Enterprise's death warrant by putting us all together." Gionna says.

"Hey, don't think like that. Yeah, we might try to kill each other sometimes but we were doing that on earth, just ask Ray." Packie says as Ray walks in, his left arm bent at a weird angle.

"Ray, what happened?" Gionna says, Ray looking at his childhood friend.

"What you see here, Gionna… is the result of getting a limb stuck in the airlock seal while fixing the air purifier." Ray says. Britt walks over to him, shaking her head in disapproval.

"Please tell me you weren't drunk when you tried to fix the air purifier, Ray?" Packie says.

"That was one time and I'm never doing that again while drunk.'' Ray says.

"Please don't, you nearly sucked the air out of half the U.S.S Nova that day." Packie says.

"That was a nice little ship, the Nova… first of it's class, tiny science vessel, crew of just 30. Now they tend to be scouts but… morely the Defiants are scouts now. Why are all the good ships retiring?" Ray says.

Gionna shrugged her shoulders, Ray flinching in pain as Britt resets his arm, putting it in a cast. Ray had heard about last night's incident and knew that if he had the chance, he'd kill Khan. Packie and Gerry walk away to get fixed up and Terry and Clay follow them to keep another fight from breaking out.

Ray walks over to Gionna, sitting on the edge of the bed, Gionna running her fingers through her hair and Ray gently grabbing Gionna's left hand, stopping her.

"I know that you're doubtful about this but the captain knows what she's doing, sweetheart." Ray says.

"Keeping him alive, I can understand but… she's listening to what he says too. Not only do I feel a little betrayed but when Kirk listened to Khan, the Enterprise nearly got destroyed and the other ship, the Vengance, crashed into San Fierro and crushed half the city… then Kirk died and they used Khan's regenerative blood to revive him. Something's gonna go wrong, I know it." Gionna says, resting her head on Ray's shoulder.

Ray hadn't seen her like this since the crash and wrapped his arms around her protectively. Now he was worried.

 **4 months ago...**

"Ivory?!" Gionna says, Ivory screaming in pain from a broken left leg. The Enterprise crashed into the spacedock, throwing both of them out of their seats, Gionna landing harshly against the floor and hurting her right hip. Gionna had managed to drag herself towards Ivory, helping him sit up as Ray walks in, seeing both of them injured.

"I'm alright, get her out of here Ray!" Ivory says as Ray runs over to them.

"No way in hell am I leaving you behind!" Gionna says, straightening Ivory's leg. Ivory puts his hands on Gionna's shoulders, forcing her to look at him.

"I'll be okay. You need to get to safety, Gionna." Ivory says, Ray reaching down and picking Gionna up in his arms, Gionna cringing in pain. Jack ran in, helping Ivory up and seeing a look in Gionna's eyes which meant whoever it was that caused the crash better run for their lives.

"Attention crew, this is captain Picard. We've been attacked by cloaked Klingon vessels which made us collide with the spacedock. All badly injured get to sickbay, everyone else to battle stations. Red alert." Picard says through the intercom.

"We're getting you two outta here! No arguments!" Ray says as they all left, walking into the sickbay and seeing how many other crew members were injured.

"We're screwed." Gionna says, Ivory putting his hand on her shoulder.

"We're gonna be fine… two old Klingon K'vorts can't do too much damage." Ivory says before the ship shakes violently as the Klingons fire more torpedoes at it. Gionna struggles against Ray, trying to get out of his arms but Ray holds on tightly as Britt runs over to them.

"How bad?!" Britt says, checking on Gionna and Ivory.

"She's got a broken hip and I screwed up my leg." Ivory says, Ray putting Gionna on one of the beds.

"Promise me that you'll come back in one piece, Ray." Gionna says as she grabs his hand, getting him to look at her.

"I promise, Gionna. I ain't letting myself get killed." Ray says, kissing Gionna's forehead before leaving, Gionna still worried.

 **Present time…**

Sam stood in her quarters, looking out of the window with a glass of wine in her hand as loud male opera music blasted around the room, very slightly vibrating the floor. She sees Carly's reflection in the window, reaching over and turning off the music.

"Sorry… it calms me now, with the borg… there are still some parts they couldn't remove, I've still got borg tech throughout my body." Sam says, taking a sip from her wine.

"You okay? You're... standing a little funny." Sam says.

"Tyler got a little aggravated, shoved me into a wall." Carly says, startling Sam because Tyler was usually calm.

"Wait… do you think… it's over you becoming my first officer?" Sam says, going to the computer on her desk.

"Probably. Who knows why Tyler does what he does, he kissed me once while he was drunk at a Christmas party." Carly says.

"Kissing… not something I've really done so don't ask me for tips." Sam says, making Carly a little curious.

"Seriously? Throughout all your teens and afterwards, you never got a boyfriend or anything?" Carly asks, Sam shaking her head.

"As a kid, I lived on my dad's ship where, despite being a Galaxy class, there weren't many kids. Then I was fully focused on studies in the academy, then I've never really had the chance to settle down working on ships. Besides, the synthetic eyes mostly turn people away." Sam says, Carly noticing the light blue and black eyes.

"We all have something about ourselves that people like to pick on. My sister made me feel bad about my eye color because she was always saying that it's not natural." Carly says.

"Blue eyes with purple… sounds like you might be a tiny bit part Vulcan, a lot of them have eyes like that. When I was younger, I had a visor instead of the eye implants and I can't count the times people used to take the visor off and hide it so I was blind. The joke turned on them when one day, I took it off myself and they saw the synth eyes… then they picked on their colour." Sam says.

"Sounds like they were insecure about themselves." Carly says, Sam nodding.

"Be careful when you head back to your quarters, okay? I'm cooperating with Khan but I think he should be castrated for what he tried to do to Gionna." Sam says, Carly nodding before leaving and walking down the corridor. Tyler saw her, stopping her.

"I don't want to talk right now." Carly says, trying to leave.

"Carly, I shouldn't have acted like I did, I'm sorry." Tyler says, Carly not believing him.

"You bashed me upside the head with a bat, then you shoved me into a wall!" Carly says.

"Yeah, and I was a blithering idiot to do so." Tyler says.

"Yeah, you were a blithering idiot, moron and whatever else you come up with to try and apologize." Carly says before pushing Tyler out of the way, walking to the turbolift and going to deck 4.

Tyler follows her, grabbing her and pinning her against the wall, holding her in place. The second he looked into her eyes, his frustration faded away and he smashed his lips against Carly's, startling her. Carly didn't push him away though, kissing back roughly as Johnny turned the corner, seeing this and charges over, pulling Tyler off of Carly.

"John, what the fuck?!" Tyler shouts.

"Keep your fucking hands off of her!" Johnny growls angrily, feeling protective of Carly.

"Johnny, I… kinda wanted that." Carly says. Johnny lets go of Tyler, pulling Carly into her quarters and closing the sliding door. "What's gotten into you?! Tyler wasn't hurting me!" She says.

"Really? Because that looked a little rough." Johnny says, Carly sighing.

"Look, just because I'm tiny it doesn't mean I wouldn't like a bit of roughness like any other girl." Carly says.

"Oh, really?" Johnny says.

"Yeah, why-" Carly says before Johnny pulls her close, kissing her rougher than Tyler did. "I... I thought that-" She says after.

"Ash and I've been fighting too much. Last one was last night and that was the end of it." Johnny says, Carly looking right at him before locking the sliding door so no one can interrupt and walking over to Johnny, pushing him against the wall and kissing him.

"The hell's goin on with you?" Tracey asks as she approaches Tyler.

"Klebitz just pulled me off of your little sister!" Tyler says, shocking Tracey.

"I hate to say it… knowing them, they're fucking right about now." Tracey says, Tyler agreeing as rage filled him. He takes out his phaser pistol, putting it on maximum and blasting the door in before firing right at Johnny, still on maximum.

"JOHN!" Carly yells as Johnny disappears, a small pile of dust at her feet. Carly pulls her own phaser, firing it and blasting Tyler's arm off, scaring the hell out of Tracey and making Tyler scream. "You damn maniac!" She yells, enraged.

"Does it fucking matter now?! You want him, there he is!" Tyler yells, pointing at the dust with his remaining hand.

Carly glances at the dust on the floor, her intercom button buzzing. "Britt?" She says after pressing the button.

"Please tell me why the fuck a phaser just went off in your quarters!" Britt says.

"Tyler just… he fucking vaporized Johnny. Get here, fix his damn arm, then we're going to see the captain!" Carly says, glaring ragefully at Tyler.


	8. Time Gates

"God, what now?" Sam says as Carly and Tyler enter her quarters, Tyler rubbing the area where Britt re-attached his arm.

"He vaporized Johnny!" Carly yells.

"You… Tyler, that's the last damn straw!" Sam says, looking and doing something on her computer.

"I'm transferring you to the lovely U.S.S Bach. Medical ship, treating planets suffering from major infections and viruses. You'll make a wonderful cleaner there." Sam says.

"Oh, no you're fucking not! I'm not leaving Enterprise, even if I have to forcefully take command!" Tyler yells, Sam looking right at him with dominant eyes, clearly having the authority.

"Or you could have the old cell in deck 27. From what I hear, that gets very hot and if you're lucky, you'll roast." Sam says, Tyler finally losing it and running at her, swinging a punch which Sam dodged perfectly, taking out her phaser and firing it on maximum stun setting, knocking Tyler out cold.

"Security!" Sam calls, Carly staring in amazement as the guards run in.

"Get him off my ship!" Sam says angrily.

 **15 minutes later.**

Tyler woke up, seeing that he was in a torpedo, a glass cover over him.

"Computer… where am I?" Tyler says.

"Planet Herogon. Population… 526. Nearest area of civilisation… 13.7 kilometers north-east." The computer says, Tyler then opening the torpedo and instantly shivering as snow fell on him.

Tyler walks across the snow filled area, mountains to his left and endless flatlands to his right.

"You can't be serious! For fuck's sake!" Tyler hears, turning to see Johnny.

"But… I shot you! There was dust-" Tyler says, Johnny holding up his tiny emergency transporter.

"Takes you to the safest spot nearest to your location. Unfortunately, the ship was at warp so the thing deemed the planet the safest spot." Johnny says.

"Well… if the dust was your shirt… wait, how have you got clothes changed in less than half an hour?" Tyler says, noticing Johnny wrapped in thick warm robes of a sort he hadn't seen before.

"The ship traveling at seven times the speed of light kind of messed with the transporter… I arrived seven months ago." Johnny says.

"Carly's gonna kill me! She shot my fucking arm off!" Tyler says.

''Good for her." Johnny says.

 **Meanwhile...**

"Carly, calm down! Tyler's gone!" Sam says, Carly pulling on her thick black hooded jacket on and buttoning it in an aggravated manner.

"So… he's not gonna get off that planet?" Carly asks, sat in the first officer's chair on the bridge.

"No. As for Johnny… we're gonna have to do the regular ceremony, just without his body being in the torpedo." Sam says, Carly remembering that the traditional funeral of a crewmember in space is to be put in a torpedo, fired into space and exploded.

"Captain… I'm seeing something. We might want to turn around and go back to that planet because… Johnny's alive." Ari says, sat at Tyler's old place at the communications panel. Carly looks at Ari as Jack runs in.

"Wait, you're supposed to-" Carly says, Jack pulling her into a hug.

"I heard about what happened. If you run into Tyler, vaporize him!" Jack says, Carly nodding.

"Ivory, turn the ship around. We're gonna go get Johnny." Sam says.

"That is a 100% copy, captain." Ivory says, making the ship come out of warp, turn around and head back towards the planet at warp 4. They arrived, the Enterprise appearing in front of the usual burst of light.

"Class M, snow and ice. Got a small colony of humans, vulcans and thorelians on it, only about 500. They're the only life on the planet, apart from sea life." Ivory says, looking at the database for the planet.

"Carly, would you care to accompany me to the surface?" Sam says, standing up.

"Yes, captain." Carly says, standing up and following Sam. 'Please be okay, John.' She thought.

"Carly, you're getting a privilege here. We're taking the captain's yacht shuttle. Most luxurious one on the ship." Sam says as they stood in the turbolift.

Carly nods, brushing tears of anger away. She was mad at Tyler and to a lesser extent, Tracey. Her older sister has always caused trouble for anyone who pissed her off.

"Okay… Carly, I'm gonna tell you something now, before we head off." Sam says as they enter the captain's yacht attached to the forward torpedo launcher.

"I'm listening." Carly says numbly.

"You and Johnny… I worked out what happened between you two, I'm fine with it. I already said, it's okay as long as it doesn't affect anyone's work. Only one… rule is the only word for it." Sam says before looking right at Carly.

"Don't get pregnant. The Enterprise E is getting decommissioned and we're all going to the new Enterprise F. That's a Century class, meaning that there's no families so if you did get pregnant, you'd have to move to a ship that does carry kids and families, work there and I highly doubt you'd be able to return to Enterprise. So just… keep that in mind." Sam says.

"Okay... I don't know if I... want to have kids." Carly says, surprising Sam.

"Well… don't miss it out but… just keep in mind that if you do, you won't come back to Enterprise. If I could, I'd captain a Galaxy X class and have a kid myself but… well, I could move to another ship but there's no point... I can't get pregnant." Sam says.

Carly took in a sharp breath, stunned.

"I'll explain it another time. Let's go get Johnny." Sam says, Carly nodding because she knew that there's a time and place for everything.

Sam disengaged the docking clamps, the shuttle coming out of the torpedo launcher and lowering its warp nacelles before speeding towards the planet, Sam looking at the scanner screen.

"Carly, you ever been on another planet?" Sam asks.

"No... I... it's all new to me." Carly says, putting her leather gloves on.

"Right, but you obviously know the rules and codes. So, we're going on a planet that has a single generational town, none of the people on it probably know about us. The colony started about 200 years ago, so we're not going in uniform. Use the replicator, get something warm on." Sam says, motioning to the replicator at the back of the shuttle.

Carly steps into the replicator, taking her jacket and uniform off, pulling on some thermal underwear on, followed by medium wash skinny jeans, a navy long sleeve shirt and grey boots, a leather coat following before emerging from the replicator, Sam nodding.

"This is gonna make Ludendorff seem like Las Venturas because of the weather." Sam says, Carly pulling the hood of her coat up over her head.

Sam landed the shuttle, making a few last minute checks before opening the rear door, Carly instantly feeling the temperature below -20.

"Temp's minus 32! Maybe we'd better wait until this dies down!" Sam shouts over the wind and snow storm before pressing the panel, the door closing and bringing snow inside with it.

"Okay… maybe we should land closer to the town." Sam says, pulling her scarf down off of her mouth.

"Yeah... provided they don't have a shoot on site policy." Carly says, grabbing her grey and navy plaid scarf out of her jacket pocket, pulling her hood off and wrapping her scarf around her neck and mouth several times.

"It wouldn't be the first time something like that's happened.'' Sam says as Carly pulls the jacket hood up over her head.

Sam moved the shuttle a few kilometers closer to the town, the lights now visible in the distance. It was low tech, looking like a village from the 15th century on earth. The main thing that set it apart from a 15th century village was the clock tower, some sort of technology in the stone brick walls. As they got closer, the snow storm died down into a light snow shower, like what people expect on christmas day.

Carly looked outside, stunned speechless by the snow. She had been to San Fierro once with her family on a Christmas vacation and it snowed but while it was peaceful, that was nothing like now.

The two enter the town, stopping when Sam calls to a human and a vulcan walking in the street.

"Hello. I'm Sam Phillips, a Starfleet captain from the planet earth. I lived on my father's ship for my childhood and I have been begging for somewhere with snow-" Sam's hand flew to her mouth, the human laughing a little while the vulcan acted like it was normal. "That wasn't quite what I was meant to say." Sam says behind her hand.

"I'm Carly, also from earth and we're here to save a man because I love-" Carly stops herself, confused.

"I think you'd better stop talking until you get used to it." The human says, Sam's eyes widening.

"Ah, yes of course, it's a truth field! I haven't seen one of those for years! I've got synthetic eyes." Sam says, looking happy.

"Doesn't that make things difficult, not being able to lie?" Carly asks.

"Not at all." The Vulcan replies.

"Yes." The human says before the two walk on.

"Be safe here. Be well!" The human says as they walk away.

"Hey! What's this town called?" Sam shouts.

"It's Thanksgiving!" The human says.

"It's April." Sam says, looking at her multi-function watch.

"No, Thanksgiving. That's what the town's called." The human says before she and the vulcan continue.

"How can a town be called Thanksgiving?" Carly asks.

"I don't know, how can an island be called Easter?" Sam says before they walk to the clock tower.

"Makes me think of the Charlie Brown Tv specials." Carly says.

"Those are from a simpler time although they're fun to watch.'' Sam says.

"We hadn't even archived warp drive back then. Though it wasn't far away, warp was in… I think they'd say the year was 2052... it was even before stardates." Carly says.

"Are you two lost?" Someone says, making them turn around. He looked to be Carly's age, maybe a little older. The first thing he noticed is Carly's eyes.  
"A half human, half vulcan... not often you see one in person." He says.

"We're looking for someone." Carly says, the man nodding.

"Well, just say the name. Here, everyone knows everyone." The guy says.

"His name is Johnny." Carly says, surprising the man.

"My brother and I ran into two men trying to kill each other. One said something about a girl with violet eyes."  
The man says.

"Are they alright?!" Carly says.

"Other than a few cuts and bruises and Tyler missing a tooth, yes. My name's Hunter." He says.

"Hunter… well, where are they?" Sam says.

"Johnny's house. It's about time you came, he's been here about seven months." Hunter says.

"The gravity and us traveling at warp 7 may have… made him teleport through time as well as space. Can you take us to his house?" Sam says, Hunter nodding before walking, Sam and Carly following.

"John, it's Hunter! I found them!" Hunter says, knocking on the door. Johnny opens the door, wrapping his arms around Carly before the four walk inside, Johnny closing the door.

"Oh, stop being all official you!" Johnny says before hugging Sam.

"Okay… hugging, not something that often happens." Sam says, returning the hug before they let go.

"Hunter, I've told you-" Another man says, walking into the living room.

"Deck, you and Tom always treat me like a kid!" Hunter says.

"Yeah, I- put a sock in it, Tyler!" Deck says, shouting towards the kitchen and Tyler shouting back.

"Hey, I'm not the one who- oh fuck!" Tyler says, walking in and seeing Sam and Carly.

"You son of a-" Carly says, Johnny grabbing her and picking her up off the ground, Carly looking right at Johnny before he kisses her.

"I missed you like crazy, Caroline." Johnny says after they stop kissing, Carly opening her eyes again.

"Carly, you sit down and tell Johnny what I said in the shuttle. I'll talk with Tyler." Sam says, her and Tyler walking into the kitchen.

"She'll go to any lengths to find him." Tyler says.

"You're a fucking idiot, trying to kill Johnny!" Sam says angrily, Tyler glancing at Johnny and Carly, Johnny's arms around Carly as they talk.

"He... took Carly from me… I wanted her." Tyler says.

"Yeah, well guess what? It's called love and it's out of your control. The same thing happened to me once and it left me heartbroken, that's why I've never had another boyfriend since." Sam says.

Tyler looks at them again, Johnny's right hand resting on Carly's right inner thigh, rubbing it gently as she finishes telling him what Sam told her.

"What did you tell her? She has that serious look in her eyes again." Tyler asks.

"Enterprise E is being decommissioned, all of us going to the new Enterprise F… F isn't a family ship so she's not allowed to have a kid, unless she agrees to move to a ship that does hold families… also that I can't have kids." Sam says.

"She said once that... she wasn't sure about having kids. At first, I thought that it was because she's career driven but... she said that she's freaked out of turning into her mom." Tyler says, Sam glancing at Carly.

"She'd never be that bad… she'd be great but it's not something to worry about right now." Sam says.

"Yeah... she's still really young." Tyler says.

"If... and it's a big if... I let you back on the crew, will you behave yourself?" Sam says.

"I'll try... I just hope that..." Tyler says, Sam nodding.

"Give her time." Sam says.

"Yeah… and I know, I'm on a case of one mess up, I'm gone." Tyler says.

"Yes, you are. But I'll keep it simple from me, you'll have enough to deal with involving the rest of the crew. Some still think you killed Johnny but everyone knows you would've." Sam says, adjusting her synthetic eyes and having her right one on thermal, seeing the different heat levels in the room.

"Don't want to run into Gionna, she's scary when she's mad." Tyler says, remembering how Gionna broke up one of Jack and Ivory's fights with her phaser on stun and the brothers ending up in sickbay for a week.

"She'd make a great security chief and yes, I'm going to offer her that." Sam says, Tyler nodding but looking down a little.

"I know I… don't deserve any promotions." Tyler says.

"Hey, you've got a job on the bridge at communications. And if you want, you can continue that same job when we move to F." Sam says, placing her hand on Tyler's shoulder.

Tyler nods before he and Sam walk into the living room and Tyler and Carly look at each other, Carly looking like she can't decide whether to stay quiet or talk.

"Okay…" Tyler takes in a deep breath. "I'm sorry. I fucked up real bad and I'm sorry for it." He says. Carly nods, biting her lip out of habit but accidentally bites too hard, splitting it open and grunting in pain, wiping the blood away.

"You alright kid?" Deck says, Carly nodding.

"It's okay… I'll put some repair spray on it when we get back to the ship. But you had other plans, didn't you captain?" Carly says, Sam smiling a little.

"Technology out of place always interests me. You lot can go back to the shuttle and I'll beam back but I want to take a look inside the clocktower." Sam says, going to the door but being stopped by Carly's hand on her shoulder.

"Not without me, you ain't." Carly says.

"Well then, looks like we're all going." Sam says before she, Carly, Johnny and Tyler walk outside and across to the clocktower.

"Well it's certainly real. Looks like something familiar, don't you think?" Sam says, looking up at the black metal with green light patches.

"Borg." Carly says, looking fed up of seeing and fighting borg.

"We ain't taking any chances, we're outta here." Tyler says.

"No, we're going inside." Sam says in her authoritative, captain voice as she opens the large wooden doors, everyone seeing a range of old items inside that were all out of place for the town. But not like the borg tech.

"That looks weird… there's something up with these." Sam says, scanning the room with her synthetic eyes, the blue changing to light green and clearly showing the tiny black squares, rectangles and circuit board-like patterns in the iris as well as the tiny white circle in the middle of the pupil.

Carly looked around cautiously, Johnny grabbing her hand and squeezing it reassuringly.

"Excuse me? Is someone there?" A young boy says, sounding younger than 10. He clearly had a french accent and Sam tracked the voice, crouching down at a fireplace.

"Hello. Who are you?" Sam says, everyone else looking through the fire area and seeing a very old themed bedroom that was bigger than the space of the building would hold.

"I am Jet." The boy says, looking curiously at Sam and Carly's eyes as both had unusual ones.

"Jet. Lovely name, Jet, I had a cat called Jet once. Tell me, where are you Jet?" Sam says.

"Well obviously, we're in Paris." Jet says, Sam nodding.

"Of course, I forget names easily. And I've also completely forgotten the date, what is it?" Sam says. Carly looks at her, seeing the side of Sam that rarely showed, the part of her that was great with kids.

"It's July 26th, 1866." Jet says, Sam nodding.

"Right, thanks. Got to go for a bit now Jet, need to do something. Later." Sam says before standing up.

"19th century Paris. That fireplace is a gateway. Jet was probably sat in front of one identical to this one, possibly the same one exactly from the past." Sam says.

Carly wasn't sure what to say, Jet looking right at her through the gap.

"Is she okay?" Jet says.

"Hey you, it's dark outside… don't you think you should go to sleep?" Sam says, crouching in front of the low burning fire again.

"Yeah… you're right. Okay, I'll go to bed." Jet says, running across his large bedroom and getting into bed.

"Carly?" Sam says, snapping Carly out of it.

"He... He's here alone." Carly manages to say, wondering where Jet's parents are.

"No… he's there. The fireplace is a gateway through time to a little boy's bedroom, in a mansion in 19th century Paris." Sam says.

"Carly? He'll be okay." Johnny says, pulling Carly into a hug and gently rubbing her back.

"Now hang on… it's round so it might flip." Sam says, standing on the semi-circle of wood and looking at the top of the fireplace, finding and hitting a button and making the whole wall section, as well as the floor and fireplace, rotate around, Sam now in the 19th century room. It was dark, Jet sitting up quickly after Sam tripped on one of his toys.

"It's you… where have you been?" Jet says.

"We were talking through the fireplace, just now. Remember?" Sam says, motioning to the fireplace.

"That was a month ago!" Jet says, Sam turning to the fireplace.

"Must be a weak connection, or a slow one. Tell me, have you seen any-" Sam says before a borg stands up beside the bed.

"Jet, don't turn around. You, what do you want with this boy?" Sam says, walking slowly and carefully closer to the bed.

"He is not ready. We require the brain." The borg says before Sam takes out her phaser pistol, Jet hiding under the covers.

Sam fires, the borg teleporting just before, Sam's beam making a scorch mark in the wall.

"Jet, it's okay. You're safe now." Sam says, sitting on the bed and lightly stroking Jet's hair.

"Are you… friendly?" Jet asks.

"Just wanting to protect. Now, I've got to get something from the other side of the fireplace, I'll be right back." Sam says, lightly kissing Jet's forehead before going back to the fireplace.

"Please don't be a month again." Jet says, Sam nodding before flipping around on the fireplace again, returning to the clocktower.

"The borg are watching him, no idea why. Also, the connections are very weak so one month for him passed in less than a minute for us." Sam says.

"He's just a kid, what would-" Carly says, realizing why.

"Kids move a lot faster than adults. Especially when they've got metal and circuitry throughout their body. Something tells me they want more than just another drone though." Sam says.

"We need to get him out of there." Carly says.

"We can't. We'll be altering the timeline. He could be your many times great grandfather for all we know. What we can do is stop the borg." Sam says.

"Okay... just-" Carly says, Sam placing her hands on Carly's shoulders. "-just be careful, captain." She says, not wanting another attempted assimilation.

"After what I went through, there's no way I'm getting assimilated again. No more drills going into my head, thank you." Sam says, hugging Carly before returning through the fireplace.


	9. Choose

"Jet?" Sam calls out as she walks into the bedroom. It was now daylight outside, the toys on the floor gone and nowhere to be seen. The bed was new too, a black cast iron frame. An older boy, about 16 walks in, seeing Sam there.

"Now I don't know about you… but imaginary friends don't come back." Jet says, Sam looking at the young man in shock. He walked quickly to Sam, pushing her against the wall and pressing their lips together before running out of the room as someone called his name. Sam stared at the open doorway in even more shock but slowly, a slight smile creeped across her face.

Sam sat on the bed for a while until Jet came back, taking off his blazer and tie and sitting next to Sam.

"So go on then. What happened?" Jet asks.

"Well… I'm not exactly from here. That fireplace is… a time gateway to the 25th century, 600 years from now. The connection is slow, so-" Sam says.

"I'm afraid I'm not quite sure what you're saying… but I got that you're from the days to come." Jet says before falling back on the bed.

"Your family must be… very rich." Sam says, remembering history class and looking around the room.

"Well I'd've thought you would have known. I'm in the french royal family, you're in the palace." Jet says, Sam going to one of the windows and seeing the newly finished Eiffel tower.

"Well… I came across this by mistake." Sam says.

"Indeed. But I'm glad you did." Jet says, Sam nodding before going to the fireplace after hearing Carly call for her.

"Hey, don't-" Jet says before Sam accidentally flips the fireplace by hitting a second button she hadn't known about.

"Well, you didn't have to come back." Carly says, holding out Sam's emergency transporter.

"Thanks… Carly, I think he loves me." Sam says.

"Are you sure?" Carly says, Sam nodding.

"I'm pretty sure that pressing me against the wall and kissing counts as love… you know I've not really done this sort of thing, I'm just not sure." Sam says.

"Sam... what's in your mind?" Carly says curiously.

"Well… the want to… go back there." Sam says. Carly nods, knowing that they can't alter anything in the timeline but was scared of losing Sam. She knew it's Sam's decision though and won't interfere in any way.

Sam thought for a moment before letting her mind guide her, slowly walking back to the fireplace and returning to the bedroom.

"Right then, I'm back." Sam says, Jet sat on the bed.

"You were gone five years." Jet says, getting up and hugging Sam. He'd clearly missed her.

"Right… I think I'm gonna spend more time here this time." Sam says, Jet nodding before the two walk out of the bedroom, into the large hallway.

2 hours later.

"So you then, Sam… where are you from?" Jet's father asks. They'd sat down, eating food as a family and Sam had joined them.

"Oh, America. Place called… Liberty City." Sam says.

"And this… Liberty City. Is that where you said you got an illness that made your eyes like that?" Jet's father asks. Sam kept trying not to freak at the fact that she was talking with the king of France.

"Yes… I became blind for a while before a scientist tried something… I'm not sure what but I can see again now." Sam says, eating some more of her food.

"Well, it's good that my son's finally found someone. If he does become king, he'll need a queen." The king says, Sam's eyes widening a little at the realization that if she wasn't careful, she could become the queen of France.

"Well… I'm just happy to be here." Sam says.

After the food, Sam and Jet returned to Jet's room, Sam sitting on the bed while Jet went to get her clothes appropriate to the time. He returned, giving Sam a long dark blue dress which she changed into.

"Now you look much better." Jet says, Sam looking at herself in the large mirror. She had to agree, long dresses suited her.

"Well… I'm not going anywhere for a while now, not at least until these borg are sorted and gone." Sam says.

"Yes… that borg when I was 9 gave me nightmares but I always dreamt that you came back and destroyed it again." Jet says, Sam smiling as she sits back down on the bed, Jet wrapping his arms around her.

"Sam… I have to say, I love you." Jet says, kissing Sam.

"I… love you too." Sam says before acting on a sudden urge, smashing their lips together and pulling Jet down to the bed.

"I don't think she plans on coming back any time soon." Carly says, standing up after watching through the fireplace. Johnny walks over, putting his arms around Carly and kissing her, Tyler keeping an eye outside the window.

'I can't believe that I tried to pull them apart.' Tyler thought, feeling guilty. Carly hadn't spoken to him since she and Sam arrived here. He let them kiss, trying to figure out how to fix things with Carly and wondering if she'll trust him again.

"I just… If she doesn't come back, I'm first officer so I'll become the captain." Carly says.

"It's gonna be okay, whatever she decides." Johnny says, brushing Carly's hair out of her face. Carly jumped for a second, only to see Deck, Hunter and Tom walk up the staircase.

"See, there she is." Hunter says, Tom looking at Carly.

"Half human, half vulcan... you were right, Hunter." Tom says, Carly looking a little nervous. "Hey, it's okay. We won't hurt you." He says.

"I... It's been a rough few days." Carly says.

"That's okay. Because Tom, Deck and Hunter make up the TDH… No Hunter, not trust doesn't help!" Tom says, seeing the look on Hunter's face.

Carly steps back behind Johnny, trying to make sense of this as Johnny grabs her hand.

"See, now you scared the hell out of her Tom!" Hunter says.

"What? Sorry Carly girl, that's just his stupid joke." Tom says, Carly realizing that the three brothers were like Jack and Ivory when they were younger and argued less. These three just threw an insult, a shove and moved on.

"Yeah... you remind me of two of my friends when they were kids." Carly says.

"Hey, all three of us are just big kids." Hunter says, throwing a scrunched up ball of paper at Tom who threw it back, missing Hunter and landing it in the burning fireplace.

"Idiots! Our friend is in-" Carly yells, putting her hand over her mouth to stop herself. If she told them, who knows what they'll do?!

"Is she okay?" Deck says.

"Uh, yeah... she just hasn't slept that much lately." Johnny says, getting Carly to sit down in a chair.

'Don't panic, she's okay! She'll come back!' Carly thought, breathing heavily as Johnny rubbed her arms, trying to calm her down.

"Hello then, you lot! Why the hell don't you change in two months?!" They hear, Sam leant against the fireplace on their side in a long golden dress, a glass of wine in her hand.

"I was just hanging with people… and they said they needed something. I- hey wee lass, you alright? Wee… lass… l a s… no, don't like it." Sam says, still leaning on the fireplace to stay balanced.

Carly was still breathing heavily, her hand on the left side of her chest because her heart was beating too quickly, making her chest hurt.

"Carly?! Sam, she's-" Johnny says as Sam runs over, feeling Carly's wrist.

"Just a panic attack, she'll be okay as long as we keep her calm." Sam says.

"Okay… wait, please tell me you aren't…" Johnny says, looking at her.

"Yes… maybe I'm a little drunk, come on, I've been there two months! Oh look… there's ponies in the sky…" Sam says, gazing out the window before falling back, passing out.

"Damn lightweight." Deck says, picking Sam up in his arms as Johnny picks Carly up out of the chair, Tyler standing up and brushing his hand against Carly's arm, calming her down some.

Carly looks at Sam, too worn out to talk as she rests her head on Johnny's shoulder. Sam mutters drunkenly, confusing Hunter and Tom.

They lay the two down in the house, putting blankets over them both and putting them near the burning fireplace to warm them up. Sam just stared at the fireplace, Carly knowing that she's thinking of the one in the clocktower and of Jet.

"Carly, panic attacks aren't in your medical file... when we get back, you're going straight to sickbay and getting checked out." Sam says, turning around to face her, Carly nodding as she was still out of breath.

"What… about you?" Carly manages to say.

"Well… Jet does indeed love me… and I do love him back. Maybe there's a part of me that feels it belongs there." Sam says.

"Don't... tell Jack I said this but-" Carly says, Sam nodding as she gently rubs Carly's shoulder.

"Just get some rest now... no one's gonna hurt you." Sam says, Carly closing her eyes and falling asleep.

'Poor kid... you're strong but you've been through too much.' Sam thought, reminding herself to talk to Jack if she goes back with Carly, Johnny and Tyler.

Sam looks at Carly's right hand after taking the glove off, noticing small surgical scars under Carly's middle and index fingers.

'I think… giving her something better sounds good. First officer's quarters…' Sam thought, realizing that because of the distractions, she hadn't moved Carly into her new personal quarters as first officer.

Carly stretched her hand and fingers out, a tingling feeling going through them.

'Surgery on tendons in hands and fingers, patient declined to explain what caused damage to the tendons, suspected from academy accident.' Sam remembered reading in Carly's medical file.

"Captain… what's gonna happen with these gates then?" Johnny asks, sat in a chair nearby.

"Get rid of the borg and shut the portals off… just a question of which side of the portals I'm on when they close." Sam says.

Johnny nods, reaching over and stroking Carly's hair.

"She ever tell you what happened to her hand and fingers?" Sam asks.

"It was back when she was in the academy and a training exercise ended in a fight between her and Tracey." Johnny says, Sam looking angry.

"Why do those two fight so much?! Family needs to stick together!" Sam says.

4 years ago, Starfleet Academy...

Tracey struggled to catch her breath, lying on the mat and looking up at the ceiling. Every time she tried a combat move on Carly, the younger girl either dodged or reversed them effortlessly.

"Tracey, get up!" The instructor ordered, blowing the whistle.

"Time... out." Tracey manages to say, the whistle being heard again as Carly readjusted her training gear.

"No time outs! You get up or forfeit!" The instructor ordered, Tracey picking herself up but falling to her knees.

"Enough!" Tracey yells, Carly looking at her with a disappointed look on her face. Tracey lifted her hand, pulling Carly's left ankle out from under her and causing her to fall. Carly's response was a kick to Tracey's face, breaking Tracey's nose and making her snap.

"You bitch!" Tracey yells, charging at Carly and a fight breaks out, Tracey strangling Carly.

Carly balled up her right hand, connecting with Tracey's jaw and throwing her off, standing up and kicking Tracey repeatedly until the instructor and several students pull them apart, pain shooting through Carly's hand, middle and index fingers.

"Carly, it's alright! It's over!" Jack says gently, rubbing Carly's shoulders as Tracey cries out in pain.

"Yeah… broken hand, I think I'll get it checked." Carly says, Tracey glaring up at her. Jack pulled Carly away and out of the training room. "I think that I damaged more than a knuckle." She says as Jack carefully examines Carly's hand.

"Yeah… off to the medical building with you." Jack says.

"Agreed... she fucking drives me insane!" Carly says as Jack helps her to the medical building.

"Ivory drives me crazy but I don't go breaking his jaw and nose!" Jack says as Ivory walks over to them, slightly startled.

"What happened?!" Ivory says.

"Carly and Tracey got into a brawl!" Jack says, shocking Ivory.

"Correction, it was hand to hand combat training… that got a bit out of control." Carly says.

"How out of control?" Ivory says, Carly showing him her bruised and swollen hand. "Fuck!" He says.

"Yeah, my thoughts exactly pal!" Carly says, yelling in pain as Ivory tries to relocate her fingers.

"Okay, that is bad! Come on tiny one!" Ivory says, him and Jack helping Carly into the medical building.

Present time...

Carly stirs around sleepily, opening her eyes for a few seconds, sleepiness overwhelming her mind and body.

"Shh... it's okay... we'll be back on the ship soon." Johnny says softly, comforting Carly.

"Where… where's the captain?" Carly asks, seeing Sam's blanket with nothing under it.

"I don't know, I fell asleep too." Johnny says.

"The tower!" Carly says, sitting up but Johnny puts his hands on her shoulders, forcing her to stay still.

"No, you're not going out there! I'm not losing you, Carly!" Johnny says. "Damn, Hunter said that it was a mild sedative." He says, startling Carly as Hunter and Tyler walk in.

"You drugged me?!" Carly says, glaring at Hunter.

"You weren't looking very happy in your sleep!" Hunter says. Carly blinks sleepily, remembering the nightmares that used to wake her up. Her legs and back felt stiff, making moving difficult.

"Told you to lie her on her side!" Tyler says as Deck and Tom walk in.

"Carly? Hunter, what exactly did you give her?" Deck says.

"Just some Valium, she was screaming in her sleep!" Hunter says.

"Does it not occur to you that across 200 years, your Valium might be a little different to ours?!" Johnny says.

"I didn't know!" Hunter yells, Carly letting out an agitated cry.

"All of you, shut it! We need to-" Carly says before a loud pulse sound blasts, Carly looking out of the window and seeing the green borg technology on the tower go out, leaving just black metal.

"No… she didn't!" Carly says, running outside before anyone could stop her.

As everyone entered the clocktower, all the different gateways closed and the only light source being from the fireplace, the half of the fire that was on that side. There was no sign of Sam.

10 minutes earlier…

Sam stepped into the clocktower, about to use the fireplace when she heard a distant scream, looking in a mirror to see a large party in a hall, everyone kneeling in front of borg drones.

Sam runs at the mirror, smashing through it and landing in the ballroom. All the borg turned to her as she started firing her phaser pistol on maximum at them. She managed four kills before they adapted, a green shield appearing each time she fired.

Sam walked backwards as a borg approaches her, raising its tactical arm. Sam opens the small hatch in the handle of the phaser, finding the energy core and taking it out, the tiny yellow marble-sized ball glowing slightly. Sam pulls out the ends of the wires that were joined to the core, taking out something she'd experimentally made. A quantum phaser core, glowing light blue. She attached the wires, putting the core in before firing as the borg got within feet of her, a blue quantum phaser beam vaporizing it.

Sam fired at the rest, all except for one being destroyed as the last adapted. It suddenly falls, a sword stabbing right through its chest.

"Sam? My god… did we just…" Jet says, running to Sam.

"Yes… the borg are gone." Sam says, the two holding each other in their arms. Sam looks back at the mirror on the wall, smashed and showing just bricks through it, the portal gone.

"And it looks like… we get to live out our lives together." Sam says, accepting that the portals were gone and there was no way home.

2 hours later.

Sam stood by the window, a glass of wine in her hand as she looked out to the night sky. Part of her wanted to go out there, to fly at maximum warp in the Enterprise and go to the first planet she finds. But she was stuck here, on earth in the 19th century… with the one she'd come to love.

Her thoughts turned to Carly, Johnny and Tyler as well as the rest of the crew.  
Khan was still in the brig... he could've found a way out by now and last time Sam saw Gionna, the younger girl was still angry... more than anger, Gionna felt betrayed.

'I hope that you didn't kill Khan but if you did... I don't blame you.' Sam thought.

"Hey, you." Jet says, standing beside Sam with his own glass of wine. The palace seemed to be in endless supply of it.

"I was out… there." Sam says, pointing in the direction of where the Enterprise was in her time.

"Do you… miss it?" Jet asks.

"I don't know… there are times when I want to go back but… I also don't want to leave you." Sam says.

"Sam... it's your decision. I'll accept which one you make.'' Jet says, kissing Sam.

"What do you mean decision, the gates are all cut. I'm stuck here." Sam says, Jet taking hold of her free hand.

"Come on. Something I'd like you to see." Jet says, leading Sam across the house.

The two entered a bedroom, a simple bed in it. It was actually Jet's old room and while Jet wished it was the bed he'd meant to show Sam, it was the thing past it.

"You've still got it!" Sam says, walking across the dark room to the fireplace in the wall.

"Yes." Jet says, Sam hearing some voices on the other side but one wasn't talking... Carly's.

"Bit of a weakened connection, I'd say it's gonna close at some point… Jet, go pack some stuff." Sam says, resting a hand on the fireplace before flipping back into the clocktower. Jet crouched down at the fire arch.

"Sam, where are we going?" Jet asks.

"Pick a star. Any star." Sam says, Jet smiling before running. "Carly?" She says. No response. Sam called Carly's name out again... this time, she heard someone standing and walking towards the other side.

"Sam?" Carly says.

"Hey, you." Sam says before flipping the fireplace again, this time standing with it and going to the clocktower herself.

Carly looks up, Sam walking over and both hugging, Sam seeing that Carly's been crying.

"Hey. I'm coming back, Jet's coming with me." Sam says.

"Wait, I-" Carly says, Sam stopping her.

"Trust me." Sam says, Carly nodding. They let go and Sam walks back to the fireplace, flipping it and ending up back in the room, finding it empty.

"Jet?" Sam calls out, walking to the other room to find Jet's father, the king, stood at the window.

"He never stopped talking about you… never loved anyone else the same." The king says, Sam realising what had happened but suppressing her emotions, her eyes looking heavy with all she'd seen and lost.

"My god. He was right, you don't look a day older." He says, Sam standing a little back but looking out of the window as a carriage pulled by two black horses left the palace grounds.

"There he goes… he's going in the east graveyard, thank god not the catacombs… he always said… if you ever came back to give you this." The king says, Sam taking an enveloped letter from him. She stood there for a while before walking back to the bedroom, returning to the clocktower and walking like she wasn't really there.

Carly looked at Sam, neither of them saying anything.

'He's gone.' Carly thought, her and Sam walking downstairs and outside, Johnny hugging Carly and Tyler pulling Sam aside.

''Captain?" Tyler says.

"I'm fine… I've lost too many people. Now… the weak signal on the gateway, I… I arrived just as the carriage pulled away with his coffin inside." Sam says, still holding back most of her emotions but failing to stop a tear from rolling down her face.

The four walk back to the captain's yacht, getting in. Sam put the envelope in her jacket pocket, deciding to read it later. Carly rests her head on Johnny's shoulder, Johnny gently rubbing his hand up and down her back.

Carly was still disoriented from the Valium, Sam noticing.

"What did they give you?" Sam says.

"Valium... something I'm never taking again.'' Carly says

"Not from here… their immune systems are a lot stronger than ours, their medication is too. Nothing wrong with it, just that say… one teaspoon of cough medicine here is like five on earth." Sam says.

Carly was about to respond but they heard shouting outside.

"Let's go before I end up strangling Hunter." Carly says, Sam nodding before starting the yacht and turning it around, leaving the town behind.


End file.
